Feel the Beat
by E7AO
Summary: The Kyuubi is turned into a hanyou do to side effects of the seal used to bind her. This leads to new discoveries and new emotions, as she finds redemption in a boy who has nothing to give but his protection, using his Fighting style, "The Beat".
1. I'm Awake

_**Chapter 1**_

_**We start our story in a dark sewer like abode. This room had one entrance from an endless hall, and pipes that lined the walls of this hall all seemed to converge in this single room. If any normal man were to look skyward, they would be able to see nothing but darkness, which also would bring the question of how there was the seemingly omni-present dim light that barely let you see beyond five feet. If one were to take a full scan of the area however, they would notice huge bars to a gate that also lead to the infinite sky at the furthest visible point, which looked as if held together by a single piece of paper. From this paper, runes seemed to spiral off in all cardinal directions. Also, if one were observant, they would notice the water-like substance flooding the area at least a foot deep. This liquid seemed to react to the world around it as water, yet if one was to touch it, it would leave them dry. Finally, if one were to have an animalistic sense of smell, they would be able to smell the fear and panic that emanated from the hall itself. One such creature that would be able to smell these emotions happened to be the great and mighty Kyuubi no Kitsune, the nine tail fox demon, and the third ranked creature in hell. This creature also happened to be on the opposite side of the sealed gates in a deep rest, hoping its bad fortune would leave it to wallow in self-pity…**_

"Why have I been awakened? Who dares to disturb my rest after being _defeated_ by that insolent human!"

'…'

(Sweat drop)

'_Well I guess the boy hasn't discovered me yet… then why is it that I have awoken? Maybe the boy is just having a nightmare and it shook me out of my sleep, I probably should check on him now that I am awakened. He's probably seen as a blessing amongst men to be holding the almighty Kyuubi within him. Maybe he's being pampered by those Uchiha or Hyuuga drones. I hope he is not arrogant or I will never be able to keep my head high. To be condemned to live the life-span of a human is bad enough, but to live those years with a fool would be utter torture.' _Channeling some of her chakra into the water like substance below her, she decided to see through the eyes of her jailer first, and then skim through his memories to see what she had missed.

The pool of water directly in front of her turned into a metallic like substance, before showing a first-person image of a mob of people, all armed to the teeth with various objects, from kitchen knives to kunai, staring at said screen.

"Demon spawn! "We finally found you!, and I bet you thought you could outrun us, the fact that you can run for such inhumane lengths shows how you truly are the Devil incarnate!" one of the mob members yelled.

"Come on! We should finish what the Yondaime started and kill this creature." An unknown ninja yelled, obviously a chunin with the vest he was wearing.

"Yeah!!!" the crowd cheered, before they all ran at the container.

"Please! What have I ever done to you! I haven't even met you before! Whatever it is, please don't hurt me again; I'll do my best to fix whatever I have done to any of you! I promise!" the young child, whom the Kyuubi recognized through a quick check only to be celebrating his ninth birthday today, said in hopes that he could at least find why he was hated so.

In his mind he thought whatever he had done to bring forth the wrath of every person he had ever met (excluding the old man, and the Ichiraku(?) family, of course) must have been disgustingly horrible, and he wanted to learn what it was so he could accept the punishment with a at least some decency to wallow in self-hatred, as whatever it was, it had to be horrible.

Seriously these good people would never do anything this mean unnecessarily. Right? (Pfft. Naive child alert and the people in the mob are going to all nine levels of hell once they die)

"Ha! The worst thing you've done is to dare play innocent to the fact you were born! You think because of a child's face we will flinch? We all know that you are just an evil manipulative bastard, and are going to kill us, or worse, whomever's child the fourth saved, the second we let our guard down. Enough talk though, it is worthless to speak with a beast such as you! Now DIE!!!" Yelled a villager, who had a bandage wrapped around a missing eye.

They charged

And then there was pain.

LOTS of pain.

And it continued until the crowd slowly dispersed, feeling content on avenging their losses and lost ones, and with the thought no living human, or demon spawn for the matter, could live with enough wounds to make him look like Swiss cheese.

Though they didn't take into count the unfortunate (for them) fact that the emotional trauma forced awake an immortal demon, who had a personal need for said boy to live as long as possible.

(Back in the Kyuubi's cage)

'… _THOSE INSULANT FOOLS!!! THEY ATTACK __**MY**__ CONTAINER! THEY SHALL ALL MEET A PAINFUL END AS HE EXACTS JUSTICE ON ALL WHO DARE DO SOMETHING AS LOW AS ATTACKING A KIT OF THEIR OWN KIND! AND TO TRY TO KILL __**ME**__ NO LESS! Though I should heal him now or this may never come to pass, and boy, does this kit deserve Kami's blessing to do so.'_ the Kyuubi ranted as she slowly poured her chakra into the many, many wounds of the boy floating unconsciously on the water in front of her seal. While this was being done, the immense body of the kitsune flickered between that of the nine tailed fox, and a human girl, a child who looked almost of the exact same age as the boy on the opposite side of the seal.

This girl had straight blood red hair which looked like a mass of strands of thick blood, shining like the liquid they seemed to be made of, with thin highlights of black spaced at fairly sporadic intervals, which seemed to absorb all light around it.

Her face seemed to have an air of regal-ness to it, even with its fair share of baby-fat still clinging to certain parts of it. She wore a simple black kimono with a single scarlet moon emblem above where her heart would be, and it had a design around it that seemed to make it the blood red pupil of a black and white shading of an eye.

What stood out the most, though, from her natural glow of beauty were her eyes. They were of a crimson colour with bold black outline, the pupils semi-slit like, which had a fat almond shape. These eyes seemed to hold a flicker of natural pride within, though through that a much more pronounced level of curiosity. At the moment, however the flickering images started to slow, until she ended back to her kitsune body, seemingly oblivious to what had occurred.

'_I should check his memories as he heals, seeing this is the first time for me to awaken this must be the first time he has been blatantly mobbed, though seeing their outlooks he most have been cold shouldered at least by the stupider of the bunch.'_ And she did do just that, and oh, just how wrong she was.

After a few minutes of speeding through all the moments of her containers memories, she found that for the first four years of his life, their were a lot of missing pieces, as if his mind was overloaded at the times and decided the memories would do to much harm. That got her riled up again as other then the times he ate stolen food, she saw nothing else. No Memories as a baby, no memories playing as a child, and the only time he smiled was just before the longest blanks, when he resolved himself never to give up.

He ate food that was all rotten and diseased looking, drank water that looked as if it had been taken from a sewer, got milk from a 'mad cow' diseased cow, and was left to sleep in an emptied janitors closets with a single moth-infested blanket he carried with him.

The fact that he survived this without any show, other than being scrawny looking, was probably the trickle of youkai chakra slightly entering and merging with his own (which was impressively large in its own right, which was astounding seeing as very little ever impressed THE Kyuubi no Kitsune).

She also found that the other children that were of such a tender age were fed lies and shown the way of hating this child by their elders, which led to a VERY lonesome upbringing for a child, whom at this age, needed all the love he could get.

Next, she got into the stage of the boys life here he started to live off the allowance of the Hokage. This part of his life was something out of a deranged-emo-the-world-is-out-to-get-me-psychopath-writer-with-a-child-abuse-fetish's worst concoction. Or if you prefer normal English, these memories were the things that would even emotionally scar Kyuubi herself if she were to live through these events now, even with years of experience with things Itachi would piss his pants at.

She saw him stretch a helping hand to an oddly pink headed girl with an abnormally large forehead who was being bullied for those facts. That night was _the _happiest moment of his life.

The the next day the same girl who had offered him friendship gave him a verbal whipping and left to laugh with her fellow blond headed ditz (From this day forth the was to be known as the 'bubblegum-bitch').

Kyuubi saw repeated similar events, where people whom her gracious container had made the world a better place for people, only to have them shove it back down his throat, with the occasional beatings and vandalism of his already run-down apartment.

The one thing that always made him smile again was how he never gave up, and never cried, no matter what life threw at him.

Another past time the villagers seemed to make into a game was try and sneak past the ANBU guards (which she also noted were never able to make it in time to help him), and see how much they could replicate the damage dealt unto the village by the Kyuubi could be redone to this young kit.

Well one of the worst that did happen was they poured gasoline onto him, and then they used a 'katon' jutsu on him, and every second he burned it seemed she subconsciously healed the boy, letting him feel the insane pain in a cycle until he blacked out by it.

She noted that he never once cried, or cursed, or even tried to avoid the punishment. When they said they would burn him alive, he stood his ground to them and didn't even flinch as they dumped the gasoline on him.

'This kit's got guts'

Then the thought,

''Maybe he isn't human'

Then,

'He is truly worthy of my respect. He is a miracle among men, to have such a pure soul. Maybe Kami sent him solely for this sad lot in life, knowing no normal man could do this.

"He bares the hatred and sin's of man with no thoughts of disbelief, self-pity or even doubts to the reasons of others. Maybe I should befriend the poor kit, he obviously deserves it…

"HOLY CRAP I'M GOING SOFT!!! THIS IS A FLESH BAG I'M TALKING ABOUT! MY PLAY THING, A CREATURE WITH NO MORE USE THEN BEING MASSACRED FOR MY ENTERTAINMENT! THE WORLD MUST BE ENDING; FIRST I AM OUTDONE BY THE VILLAGE LEADER, THEN FEELING PITY FOR THEIR SPAWN!!!

"I must keep my reputation, or when I'm dragged with this boy by the Shinigami at the world's end, I'll be the laughing stalk of the bijuu.'

What the Kyuubi didn't notice, though, was the eight year old child that silently got up, took in his surroundings, and slipped in-between the cages separating himself with the cool looking animal on the other side, and was presently sitting on her very soft and fluffy paw, staring at the really cool eyes (oh the imagination of a child) of the giant fox he was sitting on. Though she was broken from her reverie when said child voiced his creative opinion,

"I like your eyes, there soo cool! I wish I had eyes like that. Maybe that's why the world hates me… Except Jiji-chan! I wonder if it is my looks, maybe that's what the people mean when they say my birth was such a bad thing. Anyways, seeing as I can't change how I look, I guess I'll just take the punishment I get when they decide to look at my ugly face. Oh, you're looking at me!

"WOW… your eyes look so kind, and they look like big red pretty stones, like the ones that Jiji-chan has in that vault. Like the one when he told me I could be a super-cool ninja like him, so to prove I had super-awesome skills that he could be proud of, I snuck into!...

"Oh soo cool! How did you do that! Can I change into an animal like you changed into a pretty girl? And why are your cheeks red? Hey there getting redder! Is that a ninja trick like the 'henge'?" rambled the boy with the excitement of the hyper child he was. Though suddenly he seemed to go bi-polar in his speech, which slightly worried the Kyuubi, as he mumbled,

"Hey, you don't seem to hate me, and you look my age… uhmm, I can understand mm, well I can understand if you don't want to... but… uhmm… well you see I don't have a lot of friends… and, yeah, so I thought well, if you want of course, would you like to be my… hrm, would you like to be my friend?" a hint of hope was seen in his eyes, a hope like that of a person who had nothing, gave everything, and only wanted a single humble thing in return.

"NO!" quickly answered the kitsune girl, whom was flattered with the complements of the boy in front of her, felt a strange and very foreign increase to the speed of her heart, which left her discomforted.

This coupled with the facts of her earlier mental debate of her losing her edge, and the subconscious change in form to her human persona caused by her want, however well hidden by the lies she said to herself, to feel accepted by the amazing child in front of her (though really if she were to think about it he seemed to already think highly of her), had her to blindly think the boy must have done something to her using his mind. Thus the spontaneous answer, which lead to the opposite effect which she wanted.

"Oh, sorry for mentioning it then", he said dejectedly, who then turned around while thinking, '_Baka, baka, baka baka! What kind of person would want to be my friend? Man I was so stupid to think a cute girl like her would ever want to be friends with me, much less hear me talk. I bet that look will come from those beautiful eyes like they do from every one else. _

_'Well at least I know some kids who never heard of me don't show me that look. Maybe I can run from this village and go to a far off place where people will look at me like she did. Wait, bad thought. I can't give up and I'll never leave! _

_'Well I better go back to my half of this jail. I bet the people threw me in here as a punishment, and I was too stupid to figure I shouldn't slip through the bars just 'cause I could. Maybe the pretty transforming girl is my jailor, 'henge' is a ninjutsu after all, and this could be a mission to watch over the demon-child. _

_'Man I feel so bad to admit this, but I envy her so much. She's pretty, so obviously the villagers would like her, she can use ninjutsu and she's probably on as old as me, so she's smart and talented, then she's already doing missions. Sigh. Well that's life I guess'_

While the boy brooded-of-sorts on how he could be such a bad person (which happened to be echoing throughout the chamber they were in), Kyuubi was having a mental battle of what was happening to her, and of what to do, '_What's wrong with me? Every time he complements me I feel my face heat up, but it's not the same blood-boiling experience when I'm mad. It's almost as if I enjoy it. Then when I hear him say it again in his mind the effect worsens. _

_'He obviously means it, and I'm pretty sure that he is the only guy to ever complement me like that, HECK, he is the only creature to EVER complement me at all for anything other then my ability to kill. Though I bet he will stop saying such things when he finds why he is hated is me. _

_'Strangely though, I don't think I will enjoy the feeling of him leaving me alone. Odd indeed. Seriously through all these years none of my allies ever received a second thought from me once they died. _

_'Then there's the fact I have taken a human form, though it is as if I completely remade myself in the vision of a human, instead of a transformation or even illusion. Why is this? Maybe it's an effect of the seal, showing my tie with a human's life. I am in the appearance of a eight-year-old child such as himself, so maybe I will age as he does; now I am m-o-r-t-a-l… _

_'Ugh, I will never get used to that. Then there is the fact that as I hear his self-belittlement, all I want to do is comfort him. This is a first. He has been through so much pain and suffering because of me, and I feel a duty to help the boy, but I know I will end up being the cause of introducing hate in this boy, and I REALLY don't want to be the first to feel his immense distaste to all the prejudice and dishonest hatred he has received. _

_'I feel as if I know this will cause me inner turmoil, though why I don't know. Truthfully I must be going soft as I am caring for this boys life for more than the fact it is intertwined with my own… _

_'Maybe, just maybe if I play my words right and pull him to see me other then the arrogant killer I am (man did she really just admit that?), I will be able to keep him as a… a… a friend to the end of my solitude in this place... Maybe eventually more then that… WHAT? WHERE DID THAT COME FROM??? Oh man this boy is on the verge of emo, I should accept his offer before he becomes suicidal, and I DEFINITELY know I wouldn't want to cause that.'_

"Hey, kit… kit… KIT!!! Well now I have you attention, about the offer you made me…"

"Oh... so your going punish me jailor-san?" he turned, a dead serious face on,

"because if you need I'll come out for you, then you can stab me"

"No! I wont stab you for it, I…"

"Oh... so your going to kill me. Just to warn you-"

"No I wont kill you, I jus…

"Well if your not going to kill me, then..." a pondering face replaced his more serious one, which made him look very fox-like with the whisker-like marks on his face.

"Kit…"

"OH! I heard there was something really bad to do to kids. I think it was molars... no thats not right umm..."

"Kit…"

"No, no. something like mole-yeast..."

"GOD DAMN IT JUST LISTEN KIT!!! There, well I just wanted to say that I am willing to be your friend (Boy on other side of seal does a happy dance), if you meet these demands (looks intent with a concentration that would cripple most under his mighty gaze), first, you cant tell ANYONE about me, and its not that I'm ashamed…"

"Then why? I'd like to tell Jiji about it, since he'll make sure no one will hurt you for saying that!"

"Don't worry; it'll be clear in a moment. Second, listen to what I say about who I am and where we are with an open mind, and please don't judge me by it until I explain some things, and this may take some time…"

"Don't worry about that! Nothing will keep me from having a narrow mind! Thats a promise, and youd better believe it!"

"Yes, I know you will (mumbles: a great person like you wouldn't do any less)…"

"Eh? Did you saw something? I couldn't hear" the blond said, cupping his ear and squinting because of the immense concentration he had to hear what the girl on the opposite side of the gate was saying.

"Oh, I didn't say anything. And finally, will you try your hardest to get stronger?... it's not that your weak at all, you actually impress me with how strong you are, it's that I hate to see you hurt (boy looks in awe) and I need you to be able to protect yourself, and inadvertently protect me…"

"Of course! Nothing in this world will hurt you! Even if I have to cut off my leg, I'll protect you. This is a new promise, no one I find precious to me will get hurt if there is anything I can do about it. And as my first friend, that makes you the one person in the entire world who means to me more then my life." he ended with a grin he will later trade mark as the dattebyo-I-just-made-a-promise-that-I'll-never-brake-and-it-is-a-fact-that-not-even-death-will-stop-me-because-I-faced-it-once-and-I-can-do-it-again-grin.

"(demon-turned-little-girl blushes) mm, thanks for that one kit, I'm sure you will become the strongest shinobi in the world to protect your, err, precious people (though he only mentioned her)…

"If you don't get it, I mean you are my MOST precious person! Dattebyo!"

"(Blushes even heavier) well thanks for saying I'm the most precious person in the world to you, but please let me explain a few things first, then you can decide such things.

First my name is, well really it's a name given to me…"

"Well names are very important. Everyone needs a name, it's what makes you special. Umm, how about I name you?"

"well I guess you could name me if you want…"

"Are you sure? I've noticed a person's name is one of their most precious possesions. Wouldn't you like to name yourself?" he asked with a curious look. He had long since learned that a name was one thing you had, even after you die, and to defile it was a great insult. (thats advice you can trust, coming from a guy who has YEARS of first hand experience)

"No it's fine, I haven't really thought of a name before, really…

"Oh. Then I don't know many names, but I heard Hitomi was a name you gave to a girl who has beautiful eyes... Or was it beautiful girls? Well, either way, it fits, so I think it's a great name!"

"(Face turns tomato on her) I do like the name, Hitomi, thanks a lot kit…

"Can I ask a question? Why do you always call me kit. If you want to know my name, just ask."

"Oh I know your name, and don't look so down, I don't like to see you like that, but just think of it as a nickname, you can decide to keep it if you want to be my friend…"

"I already told you, nothing in the world could possibly stop me from being your friend, and I find it an honour that a girl thats so pretty would possibly want to be a friend to a scrawny kid like me. So stop saying that Hito-chan, if I can call you that."

"(She kind of reminds me of Hinata at the moment… and yes she is doing it again) well don't decide yet, but you can call me Hito-chan if you want. Well like I was saying, the name that most people know me for is the Kyuubi no Kitsune, and please remember what the first thing I needed you to do for me was. Well I am a demon, Kit, and we are similar to humans (wow, human demon comparison, this boy is good at his gift of changing others for the better) as we can use chakra, or more we are made of chakra and take a physical manifestation.

"What we differ in though, is that because we are made of chakra we are basically immortal and much better at our use of chakra then humans normally are. But don't get me wrong, we really are creatures of this world, just made with a greater affinity to chakra then any one else.

"Now the reason that most people see demons as bad things, as you must have taken notice to, is because this power causes us to grow arrogant and over confident in our strength, and I must admit I am not free of this effect (really this boy's natural good is infective).

"The type of demon that I am is known as a bijuu, a tailed beast, and as such I am the strongest of all. It would take the eighth and seventh tails both to even get close to defeating me, and this power caused me to become bored, as I sought out fighters who I could entertain myself with, which actually was quite a recent event, and it lead me to what you humans called the greatest shinobi of all time, the Yondaime Hokage, as if anyone would fight me with a brave heart then it would be him.

"Though I am sure you know of you villages history, and am surprised to find me alive, the reason I 'attacked' the village was I wished to dual with someone worthy, but the humans on guard were quick to decide for me that I would attack, and even as I tried to reason with them, they continued to words into my mouth, until the point I was fed up with the annoyance of that, the petty attacks they besieged upon me, and the fact that I really wanted to fight, I decide to it couldn't harm anyone if I at least incapacitated a few of them, though sadly I know this is no excuse.

"While slowly fighting off the weaklings at my feet, an evil man with the power of an evil doujutsu cast a very powerful genjutsu that I let slip past my defenses because of all the distractions, and it enticed me to start killing, then destroying the village. By this time the fourth came, and contrary to what is taught to the younglings of the village, he could not kill me, as I explained earlier. Though because of the exact same reasons, he was able to seal me into a new born child…"

"Me" Naruto whispered as quiet as he could, a look of stricken realization on his face,

"Yes it was you…" Hitomi said, not able to look him in the eye as guilt was deeply embedded in her own.

"So they weren't just insulting me... they were telling the truth to me. I am a demon." he whispered in reply, the same look of realization adorning his face.

"NO! Don't say such things kit, and please understand that you are the same as other people, if not better. You hold inside you a power no man can tame, yet you act no differently then any on else, even though it must be straining to have to suppress such a force… it is why the more you try to control your chakra the more painful it is to concentrate, as you subconsciously refuse to stop suppressing my chakra, as well as absorbing it and expanding your own tenketsu points.

"So in a way, you continuously are controlling your chakra, and any extra focus is like left over, so that is why you cannot perform the first-year academy jutsu like everyone else can. Also as you must figure, because I am sealed within you, we are presently in you subconscious mind.

"So kit I must say that I really am sorry for being the reason everyone hates you, and I can understand if you never want to see me again, so really I must say that I have no regrets in telling you, your amazing personality to take all the shit the people gave you, yet respond so innocently no matter what, and it has sort of rubbed off on me I guess, and I have become such a better person because of the short time (seriously that was ALL in a few hours) I've known you, so thanks. And for whatever short time I was happy to be your friend."

"… This is so much to take in right now. With the answer to the question I have had for my entire life, I gain even more questions like 'why me?' Then there is the fact that all the hatred I've received, it was never my fault.

"Hmm... If thats right, I have seen and heard of what great things these people can do... I got it! I've seen how these people hold their precious people above their life, and since I now have a precious person to take care of, I know that I would do anything to protect you. This makes me want to protect them and their precious people.

"If what you said is right, that means they are all in pain because they failed to protect their precious people. I never want that to happen to the villager's, so long as I have these two arms to protect them with.

"I remember the old man telling me that his job was something like that... Then that's it! I will live my life so that I can become the Hokage! Not like any other, either. I will be the best Hokage that ever lived! I will help heal the people by saving them from any other pain! Dattebyo!" he exclaimed, once again wearing the 'dattebyo-I-just-made-a-promise-that-I'll-never-brake-and-it-is-a-fact-that-not-even-death-will-stop-me-because-I-faced-it-once-and-I-can-do-it-again-grin' grin.

With this said Naruto walked up to Kyuubi, who was just past the seal/gate. And stopped. Unknowing if he was to hit her, she became slightly wary as he wore an emotionless mask and stared with his seemingly all seeing eyes into her soul (byakugan had nothing on this).

Suddenly he moved forward so quick it would be hard to tell he was where he was before, and to show how much this was so, Hitomi couldn't even react until she found herself enveloped in a warm hug which made her feel… complete. It was as if Naruto was the missing piece the puzzle that was her. He then said,

'Hito-_chan_, I decided a while ago that you were my most precious person, and my best friend. You could have said you ate my parents, but if what you said was true, which I believe it was, demons are arrogant and proud, but you Hito-chan, were able to show me how humbled you are now, and as I now choose to live my life, I believe that a person is defined by their honest actions which are done in the present, and yours show me that you are truly great in person and character, and if you really are serious on being my friend I would love to have you as one." Naruto said warmly, only to feel his embrace returned two fold as Hitomi hugged him back,

"Oh of course Kit! I want to be your friend to the point it hurts to think of you otherwise. You've really made me happy to hear you accept me even with the knowledge of what I am, and my involvement in your past. Thank you… _Naruto-kun_." She responded, with the full force and effect one would have when agreeing to marry.

"Well that makes me glad that your happy Hito-chan, and don't worry, you can call me whatever name you want now that we are 'officially' friends!"

They stayed hugging for quite some time, and if any one was to look at Naruto's fully healed and sleeping body, which had been mysteriously shunshined to his apartment, they would see a smile on his face, so honest, pure and loving that it would make anyone soften up, and maybe if they really listened closely, they would hear him breath-out the words, _"You made my first birthday present better then anything I could hope for, Hito-chan"_.


	2. Life is Good?

_**Chapter 2**_

'Life is good.' That was one thing that our young orange-clad protagonist never imagined to think before a year ago. He traveled around the village at break-neck speeds, much to fast for any ordinary child, heck; even a jounin would find this difficult pace. He now had an arsenal of fourteen low-D through high-C class jutsu, and this is before the genin exams that were going to take place within the hour. He had mastered the art of free form genjutsu, able to manipulate most chunin, even some lower jounin with the effort of making a few hand signs. He could even take on the genii Uchiha-teme and Hyuuga prick, Sasuke and Neji, in an all out taijutsu match (though no one was too know this… yet). Funny though, none of these were the reasons that he ran through the streets with a smile on his face, completely oblivious to the horrid stares of hatred and promised death he was receiving on his little trip. The real reason he was blissfully content was because of a single person, who happened to be the reason that he became the skillful ninja-to-be he was now. This person, was the tenant inside his naval (odd phrase, no matter what the content), the Kyuubi no Kitsune, or as he referred to, Hitomi-chan.

Hitomi and Naruto, who had been best of friends right off the bat, had spent about ninety-seven percent of the last eight months in each others presence, or just talking to each other. For the first few days they met at night to train Naruto to be a better ninja, by introducing him to the near bottomless well of information the Kyuubi was, and he took to his teachings like a fish to water. He had learned the basic theories to all ninja arts and business (such as politics, etiquette, human anatomy, chakra, etc.), though the first thing they agreed upon was to keep up a façade of a super-hyper-ADD-ramen-addicted-orange-loving-boasting-idiot-with-a-ninja-deficiency-issued child. This was done because it was the total opposite of what he truly was, it helped his ninja training by keeping a mask which needed a large amount of focus to maintain, and because it was a laugh when Naruto told Hito-chan of the ridiculous things he did (like seriously, who in their right mind would use a phrase like 'believe it'? or boast on becoming a Hokage and respecting the position, then painting on the Hokage monument minutes latter? And what had both of them laugh for nights on end at the mere mention was the fact that what imbecile who thought they could be a ninja would dress in near neon orange on purpose? Like the merchants _didn't_ intend to make him a human dart board by only throwing him the rags to wear).

After learning the basics, Naruto was able to rework his mindscape into something a little more decent for his BFF. The once dreary sewer like visage was now a meadow of grass with slight rolling hills, a small forest in a corner section and in patches through-out the outer edges, which was an impossibly high mountain range with the original seal on the top of the tallest and the runes cascading down all sides. On three opposite corners of his mindscape there were giant waterfalls that lead into the moat like circle of water on the inner side of the mountains. From this circular body of water dozens of streams flowed in between the numerous hills, until they all reconnected in the center for another moat like structure, which encompassed a hey-hole shaped island, which had a small cottage in the center with two rooms, a master bedroom, complete with a queen sized bed and a TV. which could view Naruto's memories, and a living room, with every non-electrical game in existence (including board games like Shoji or Go all the way through a deck of cards and spin-tops). It also had a ladder to get to the roof, where you could lie down on the padded area on the roof to look at the forever blue skies with wispy clouds running by and a sun that shown with an ethereal glow, not too bright that it would blind you upon looking at it, though not too dim that it lost its ability to shed light (though it was most likely that Naruto tampered with the physics in this world, if only slightly). To say Hitomi was happy with the renovations would be the understatement of the year. After that night Naruto dreamt up the place, Hitomi basically pounced on him and kissed his cheeks, stars in her eyes as if she had just seen the Messiah. After she came to of course, they both sat looking at his handy-work in an eerie silence, with matching shades of tomato red on their faces.

In his newly created realm, he mastered the procedures of tree walking and water walking, though as it only was his mind that understood it, it still only took him a few hours to perfect it in his own body. He was taught all the forms to a long thought extinct form of fighting, shoaling kung-fu, which really was just a basic, all-rounded style of fighting, though from it most modern day styles could trace some lineage back to it. With this knowledge, he trained for hours on end with all the techniques Hitomi had to offer.

On the outside, he was training with equal output, as he began to get into a basic training routine which had his muscles toned by the end of the eight month period. Although the word 'training' wasn't exactly what anyone who saw him in the process would call it, as one such example was: he was to meditate flowing his chakra to each tenketsu and send bursts out, feeling his chakra reflect back off foreign objects as he sensed all living life in his field of 'view', though only in a generic sense, as Hitomi said only with a greater control over his chakra would he feel its movement with greater precision. That in its self would take concentration of a person much beyond his years, though to make it better for 'under stress' situations, he decided to do it while performing a handstand… on two kunai, blades pointing into his palms, only a steady layer of chakra saving his hands from certain acupuncture… while on top of a pond, using the kunai as a transmitter between his chakra and the water, like you would for a pair of sandals you would normally wear… much to the chagrin of Hitomi who inquired that the personality changing abilities of Naruto went both ways, as what he would do was near suicidal.

Back to the present, though, he had just made it to the school, using his chakra walking exorcise to bypass the secretary, who normally tried her best to slow him down when the rare occasion of him coming on time came by, slid through an open window on the third floor, and walked into his class across the hall.

Like always, no one took notice to him.

He looked around and saw all the kids in the class continued their talking as if nothing had changed. This made him mentally sigh. _'Even if they let me pass in next three years, I'll never get anywhere with the classmates I have as team members'_, he thought as he walked to his seat in the back corner on the far side from the window. Normally students got to choose their seats daily, but with his continual late streak and the fact their where always two extra seats in the class, he was always forced to sit alone in his personal little corner. Not that he minded, though, he didn't care for his classmates, as none of them knew the real him, and thus he never did try to learn their names.

As he waited for the sensei to come, he started having some small talk with Hitomi. Soon enough, though, something broke him out of his trance like state as two students he was sure weren't part of his class came in and sat besides him.

"Mind if we sit here?", asked the boy. He was some what scruffy looking, in Naruto's opinion. He had dark skin, easily identifying him as a foreigner, hard brown eyes which seemed to radiate self-confidence, and light bleached hair that was in a buzz cut. He wore a street merchants clothing, which was a plain white, and only had a single design to it, which appeared to be his mon, two snakes swirling up what looked like a sickle.

"It's not really my choice, is it? But either way I would be glad to have guests." Replied Naruto, eyeing them both trying to find more about them through appearance, and how they reacted to a looser 'mask', showing more of his normal edge (Hitomi thought he was too cool like that, plus he was naturally kind and giving, she basically fainted the first few times she thought of him after they had gotten closer, though they both were clueless as to why).

"Thanks, but where are our manners. I am Hatenkire Rikako, and this is Kenparichi Genji. We both were permitted to graduate early in our own classes, but as the only ones our age, we have been made a team from separate classes, which is normally unusual. So far, sadly, we have yet to find another member in our squad and so we may have to wait till next year to find our third, unless someone in this class pulls through, _which is unlikely_…" Rika said as if explaining to an idiot, and mumbling the last part while glaring heavily at all the students, including a not-so-well hidden glance to him. Naruto then studied her. She wore standard ninja wear of a plain long sleeve shirt and pants, all dark blue. She had plain brown eyes, and similar shoulder-length brown hair. The only thing that would set her apart from a group was the unmistakable air of self-centered cockiness.

Naruto was sure that they were pampered genii, like that Uchiha teme. He was also sure they didn't care to look _'underneath the underneath'_, as Hitomi said, drilling the thought into his head, as they obviously thought he was the idiot of the bunch, staying in the back on purpose to avoid attention from his sensei, and looked down upon, thus the isolation. They even bought it with a lesser 'mask'. _'If Jiji gets the tests marked personally as he said, I may have to be in their team _(shivers)_. Might as well play the part and astound them when the time comes, maybe that will open their eyes, even make them better trust me as a team mate."_He thought, getting an affirmative reply from Hitomi.

By then, though, the teacher, Kuzuyu-sensei, came in.

"All right class, we are about to give out the written part of the exam. After which we will g outside to let you demonstrate your skills…" The teacher drawled on, not even attempting to look in Naruto's general direction as usual. If he had he would have noticed that the Kyuubi kid was tuning him out, while making a game plan onto how much skill he would demonstrate, what techniques to use to substitute for the 'Bunshin' with, and so forth. And then a creepy grin crept its way onto his face, slightly disturbing the two 'prodigies' beside him.

--time skip: Thirty min.—

Oh was he happy. He had just shown a Ten-ten level of skill at weapons usage, though he purposely faulted on most of the written test on the theories and history (like any of what they taught was correct). He then demonstrated the three necessary jutsu, though he only worded "Bunshin no Jutsu!" as he performed a genjutsu on the vicinity to make it look as if there were two of him, which only the Hokage and jounin judges caught onto. Finally, it was about to be time to face a judge in the last taijutsu match of the day (Uz is the last name in the list in this class), and he was ready to show the world 'the flow' (to be pronounced like a hippy says peace), as he personally dubbed the ancient martial art of his because of the fact that it was based off the movements of living creatures and the 'flow' of all life.

That was all swell until he found his opponent to be the villages hailed taijutsu master, Gai. This would normally be fine, as he never showed contempt for the blond throughout the exams, but as soon as he saw said blond get into 'the flow's' most versatile stance he announced he would go at three quarters of his ability, and if Naruto could land a single hit on him then he would pass with full marks. This got different reactions from different people, as the judges, who were all hand picked by the Hokage and had no standings on the pariah of the village, thought this was an act of malice, as most of them couldn't take Gai on mano-o-mano at half his strength, let alone land a hit on him at three quarters. The teachers looked at Gai as if he was the Yondaime who had come back from the grave to kill Kyuubi as an act of divine justice. The students who had all faced him at a twentieth of his strength thought Naruto was a dead man walking, though most didn't look like it mattered and others looked happy and started talking amongst themselves. Finally the Hokage just asked for silence and leaned back in his chair with an air of curiosity pointed to the to individuals standing in a standard Sumo wrester like ring at what was going to happen next, as he understood as much as anyone his level should that the stance his secretly favorite genin hopeful just took was near perfect for any usage, from an attack to a counter or even straight defense if in the right hands, and he hoped against hope Naruto was at the taijutsu expert level needed for the stance to be effective. Boy was he in for the shock of his life.

The fight was just declared started. Though all the viewers would beg to differ. Naruto was in his low stance, both palms facing up, his arms stiff and facing opposite ways, in front and behind him, making a perfect line. Gai was standing in a standard academy taught taijutsu stance, though Naruto could easily identify the small tweaks to the stance to fit an attack first, fast, and strongly style of fighting, and placed his weight accordingly to be able to quickly evade and use his smaller stature and weight to his advantage. This was then seen by Gai, who leaned off the stances 'strength' aspect to be able to control his center of gravity, so to be able to pivot quickly if his momentum was too great _when_he was to be evaded. This small war of matching each others first move went on for five minutes, and the onlookers basically saw Naruto shifting as if he were a nervous wreck (which they thought he was), and only the Hokage and a few of the stronger jounin lined up noticed Gai's subtle shifts in tension between his muscles, which then lead to all of them to think he was seriously taking this boy down, as only with his self proclaimed eternal rival did he ever take so much care into what he did, which usually lead to fights which destroyed entire training grounds. Thus most were surprised by the seemingly random actions of Gai when he raised his hand, signaling the end of the match and said with an insanely un-Gai level of seriousness,

"Stop now, the youthful youth has proven his skill. Though I have yet to see his fighting style, he has the understanding of taijutsu to a level I have only seen in me and those stronger then me. I understand he **must**have at least a chunin-turning-jounin's level of taijutsu, as no one has ever been able to not only see what I intended to do through stance alone, but counter it accordingly in a single stance no less. _WHEN_HE BECOMES A NINJA AFTER THIS EXAM, HOKAGE-SAMA, I INTEND ON TEACHING HIM PERSONALLY TO BECOME A GREATER MASTER THEN I IN THE FIELD, IF HE WISHES. IF HE WORKS HARD WITH OVERSEALUS AMOUNTS OF ETERNAL YOUTH AS HE HAS SHOWN, HE WILL POSSIBLY BE MORE YOUTHFUL THAN THE YONDAIME IN A FEW YEARS. HE MAY SURPASS ALL THE HOKAGE BEFORE HIM WHEN HE ACHIEVES HIS YOUTHFULLY YOUTHFUL DREAM OF HIS THAT HE SO YOUTHFULLY BOASTS IN SUCH A YOUTHFULL MANNER! YOSH! I PROMISE THAT I WILL HELP THIS BOY BECOME GREAT OR ELSE I WILL DO EIGHTY FIVE LAPS FROM HERE TO SUNAGAKURE ON MY HANDS, AND IF I CANNOT DO THIS I WILL CLIMB THE HOKAGE MONUMENT WITH FIVE BOULDERS STRAPPED TO MY BACK!" he ended with a good-guy pose that temporarily blinded everyone.

Queue mass sweat-dropage. Yaaa… serious Gai seems to only live for two minutes… Then clapping could be heard coming from the Hokage's direction.

"It seems Naruto has outdone himself. As a judge in this exam, I announce that Naruto is to be certified as a genin and official ninja of this village. Does anyone disagree?" though most looked sour, no one would disagree if the Hokage personally enlisted a ninja, though legally none could. "Then so be it. Naruto Uzumaki, I hereby state you as a genin and soldier of Konohagakure, enlisted under I, the Sandaime Hokage's orders. Here is your Hitaite to signify this." He said with pride evident in his voice as he handed Naruto the dark maroon banded head protector, whom then strapped it around his forehead and slid his goggles down around his neck, though hidden by his deranged orange outfit's neck-band.

"Thanks, ojisan, this means a lot to me. More then you could possibly understand." Answered the blond in a solemn tone, as the Hokage ruffled his hair.

"Go on home and get your rest, tomorrow is going to be a big day. I would treat you to ramen, but this decision is going to lead to more paperwork _*sigh_. Well I have seen that you met your two team-mates, and I think you should try to get to know them better, and let them know _you_. I know it'll be hard after all you've been through, but you really need more friends your age. And you never know what may happen between you and that girl, Rika-chan" the elderly man said in a warm voice, though a bit slyly in the end, poking Naruto in the side, only to be swatted away,

"Jiji, come on, I'm only eight and a half for crying out loud! I may be a child, but I am not that naive that I don't know what you're talking about! I don't even like girls!" complained Blondie. Unknown to the duo inside of the boy, a girl was going through emotional trauma. First for an unknown reason to her, she despised the Rika girl as soon as the Sandaime made his comment, then she went into a confused state as to why that happened, followed by a sense of relief as Naruto started his mini-rant, only to be squashed by a sense of sadness, enough to make her wary eyes tear, which also lead to a confusion within her head, though a small river of blind fury started to grow as she rethought the last few words her best friend just blurted out. Naruto was about to find out what the phrase "hell hath no fury as a woman scorned" meant, and that it applied to eight year old girls with the mentality of a girl who was born at the same age and confused of the many emotions that came along with the body she was begotten… (I am truly evil… MWAHAHAHAHAAA)

"Well Naruto, you have proven your youth to me, so I wish that after you meet your team tomorrow you could meet me at my personal training ground, where you can decide whether to take my extra training or not. It is at training ground 13, which you can ask your sensei about when the time comes. YOSH! FOR NOW I MUST GO AND DO TEN LAPS AROUND KONOHA!" Gai said, with a lessened level of seriousness, though that too was short lived as he raced through the forest to the nearest section of the great wall, a green blur hardly visible.

"Oyaji, is he o.k. to be around? I could tell there is a lot he could help me with, but that suit kind of scares me. Seriously I think you should ban that before some unknowing child follows in his footsteps" Naruto whispered to the Hokage with a shudder at the thought of TWO green clad beasts running through Konoha with that kind of speed.

--some class in the building besides the training ground currently in use—

"AAAAATCHOOOOOOO", sneezed a large eyed boy, sitting in the back of his class.

'_Weird I feel like I should go study what the fountain of youth is. Also maybe I should go find a green spandex suit. Maybe that will help with my taijutsu, since that's the only thing I can really do! Yosh!'_

--back with Naruto, in a secluded part of the forest about twenty minutes later—

This clearing was a symbol of pure nature at its finest. The grass was all just tall enough that bare-foot it would just be at your ankle, slightly tickling to your feet when walking through. Though through the grass you could feel the earth underneath was near perfectly leveled. It was about fifty metres by forty, though it was shaped more like an egg, in all three dimensions as well. On a full half of the clearing, a river ran by, clinging closely to the base of the slightly raised oval hill, which were about twenty metres long at its largest by the narrower end of the field and about ten metres at the fattest point. The grassy land was surrounded by a forest, which started with sparsely populated trees, but as you got deeper into it you would hardly have a few feet of clear view. On the other side of the river was a flat plain that went about five feet in until it hit a wall of bamboo, most varying from a foot to thirteen. Unlike most training grounds, this one had no equipment for its purpose, and was generally far from any civilization and was normally vacant of sentient beings. This must have been a special day. On the peek of the hill, a teen, easily identifiable as around sixteen or so was meditating, while on the far end, in between the loosely placed trees, a boy with stunningly blond hair and an equally bright orange jumpsuit stood still.

Naruto had a dilemma. He really couldn't figure out who it was that was in his usually training spot. The person had his back to him, and was sitting in a lotus position, but it was easy to tell he was manipulating his chakra throughout his body, signifying he was ninja. But seriously, he chose this spot as carefully as he could so it had everything he needed, but was so far off no one would bother to come here, and in the past few months he never met anyone. 'So why now?'

'Black hair. A very common thing, not too distinguishing other then its length and it was in a pony tail. Bags under his eyes. A sign of lack of sleep or stress. Also not too uncommon in a shinobi village. Killing people for a living got on your nerves. Black tee-shirt and slacks. Was this guy, mister basics? A symbol of an uchiha, white base and red top. Obviously means he is of the Uchiha clan… That's on the other side of the village, what's he doing here?' thought the blond, before he was interrupted by an emotionless voice.

"What is it you seek, child? Why do you hide yourself?" the mystery Uchiha questioned somehow pulling off a very commanding tone to his leveled voice. Naruto was pretty sure it had something to do with the fluctuation of chakra the simple teen was emitting. It seemed to make the air heavy as lead and made you just _feel_ death, if that was possible.

Shyly dragging his feet along the unevenly cut grass floor, with an air of meekness, as if he was just caught taking a cookie when he wasn't supposed to, said boy answered, looking into the Uchiha's obsidian eyes,

"Well… sir this is where I normally train. I just am not normally accustomed to guests. Though I am sure you, like the rest of the village, would like to have me dead, and any ninja worth his title would see this is the ideal location. My first thought was that you were here to kill me, though it doesn't seem like it now". A pregnant pause,

"No offense, of course." He added quickly, hoping to improve whatever condition he was in.

"None taken, boy. I have too noticed the villager's animosity towards you the few times you were a topic of their discussion. It seems now most people believe that you have used a genjutsu on your judges to pass as a ninja, though I hardly see you being able to defeat Gai-san in such a matter. No offense, of course,"

"None taken"

"Well though it has piqued my curiosity, I am sure you have no knowledge of the issue, and no one who does will not disclose the information. As such I believe I have nothing more to gain from you. I will make my way now" The Uchiha said, about to walk out, before he paused mid-step.

"Why do you look to me as useless now that you believe I have no answers for you? You are a first to ever to know of me, yet not act abruptly against me. WHY? And then just to brush me aside as if I am a useless tool! How can you act like this?" The blond boy nearly shouted, clearly forgetting the sense of doom that still hung in the air because being ignored was on the same level as being beaten in his mind.

"Well it seems you have more to you then I thought. The actions of those around you have led you to believe there is no middle ground to things. Also you take my killing intent head on as if it does not exist; many senior genin couldn't do what you have done. If you want an answer to your question though, it is fairly simple. As shinobi, we need to be able to distinguish things that are necessary and those that are not in an instant, and with the danger of living in a world where anyone can kill you, you always have to be weary. It seems as though I was wrong about you, even though you still have your childish views on how shinobi are more then just tools. You are wise to be training at such a young age, most do not, and end up wasting their time trying to grow bonds between themselves instead. If I come to see you again, I wish to measure your progress, so be prepared at **all** times…" The obsidian eyed teen said, ending with a little push in killing intent before letting it drop, much to relief of the eight year old that was forced down to a knee from the pressure alone.

"By the way," the Uchiha said, just on the border between the field and forest, "My name is Itachi, Uchiha Itachi.". Immediately he shunshined out of the area, a trail of fallen leaves the only indicator of where he once stood.

"That... Was… So… AWESOME!!!!! The guy was all _'your no use to me'_, then all _'your cool kid'_, then he was all _'I may come to get you when you least expect it'_and then the cool leaves came out of NO WHERE and he DISAPPEARED!!! And how strong was he to make me fall with out even looking my way!!! I have GOT to get Hito-chan to teach me that!" Exclaimed the young and easily influenced boy with great _exuberance_.

He then noticed he was behind schedule for his training, and got straight to work…

It hit him like a ton of bricks.

He. Was. A. NINJA!!!

People heard his bursts of joy from Kumo to the Crescent Moon islands.

Life was good.


	3. One Hectic Day

**Chapter 3**

Naruto was sprawled out on his bed, a line of drool going down, and then back up his mouth as he snored.

--Naruto's Dream World--

Naruto was in heaven. Literally. As he walked through the clouds thousands of huge, talking ramen bowls were egging him on to the giant dais. On it was Hitomi-chan holding out a perfect bowl of miso-ramen, smiling her million-dollar smile, as well as Teuchi-oyaji and Ayame-chan standing in their ramen stand, holding each other while crying tears of joy about how they finally made the "URUTOMATTO RAMEN!" (Ultimate ramen) and that they were honored that he would eat it.

As he got up to Hitomi, he took the ramen then hugged her as tight as he could, also crying anime tears of joy and thanking her for everything she'd done. Finally, as he looked down to the glowing bowl of ramen, mystically floating in his hands, it started to talk,

"Naruto, I am the chosen ramen. Only you can eat my heavenly broth and noodle mix. Make sure you eat me slowly, or else you won't be satisfied once we're done. Really once you BEEEEEEEEEEP me, you may think I was BEEEEEEEEEEP to fast, so really try and savor the time you have me. So please begin to BEEEEEEEEEEP me to your hearts content!"

--Exit Dream World--

BEEEEEEEEEEP!

BEEEEEEEEEEP!

BEEEE-

_**CRUNCH!**_

"_I hope Kami decides that she never invented freakin' ALARM CLOCKS! I thought I was becoming a pervert! First Hitomi-chan gets pissed for something stupid I said, then when I tried to freaking apologize slip up and say 'I don't think of you as a girl"! Then I have to stop training for the night to show _sincerity_! Now I have the perfect dream and it gets screwed at the best part..." _mumbled Naruto, turning over, trying to reclaim the lost dream. Or at least he was, until a shuriken he didn't even hear coming ended up a millimeter from his nose.

If that didn't wake him up, the burning explosive note it pinned to his bed sure did.

Boom.

Now we see a Naruto in his pajamas, with soot covering his face breathing heavily, crouching with his back to his only drawer, facing away from the general direction of the assailant.

_'Who the hell was that!?!? Ninja have never come to my apartment to beat me! Maybe becoming a ninja sealed the deal. Kami, Hito-chan isn't up yet. This could be a probl-"_

Or at least he _thought_ it was away from his assassin.

Three shuriken now led a trail of were his family jewels were as he stood, legs spread as far as he could afford.

As he tried to figure out what was happening, he noticed by the sunshine coming in from the window, that it was about twenty minutes to when he was supposed to meet his team. Since he decided to drop his 'mask' from now on, he wouldn't want the first people to learn this think he was a tardy person.

He then rolled back over the drawer, ending up on the other side, a kunai embedded in the edge he just slipped past.

An afterthought occurred that he would also like to be very much alive in about twenty minutes.

An imaginary light bulb appeared over his head, and he set to work. Jumping over the drawer, flipping mid-air, he reached out and grabbed the cubby that stored his day clothes and ripped it out.

Anime tear-eyes appeared as he thought how much this would shrink his Gama-chan (the wallet). Quick as he could, he grabbed the black tee-shirt he wore underneath his jacket and his orange pants. Then, still airborne, he kicked the drawer in the inside wall, he spun it so that his secret compartment, in which he kept his equipment pouch in was visible, and took it.

Landing in a handstand he caught the drawer on his outstretched foot, sticking it there with chakra. From that position he moved into a front roll, the leg with the drawer compartment attached to it outstretched. About halfway through the motion he moved his prone leg down a bit, blocking a dozen or so shuriken.

As he finished the roll, dropping the drawer, as it reached the limit of its use, and he dashed into the doorway in front of him, into the washroom.

Slamming the door behind him, he heard the tell-tale sound of an army of kunai and shuriken embedding them selves on the other side. Yanking out six identical seals from his pack, he charged them with chakra as he threw them to each surface in the interior of the very small, rectangular room. This caused a lock down to anything from getting in or out of the room as the web of runes spread from each seal, meeting at each edge and corner.

Seeing as his air supply would also be limited, Naruto quickly got changed. Then using a minor fire style jutsu, burned each seal as he opened the loose tile on the floor, exposing the escape route he made for such an occasion. He scoffed as he dropped into the air vents, thinking how his Jiji thought he was being paranoid when he brought up the idea.

--City streets, outside apartment complex--

A civilian screamed as an air duct cover was blown on the adjacent wall, fire gushing out. From inside the fire, a slightly singed orange and black blob shot out, a smoke trail following him, as well as a flaming dragon's head that morphed from the ball of fire. As Naruto, barefoot, started leaping his way to the predestinated team training ground, a comic look of panic crept on his face as the flaming dragon, which he had no clue what it was, started following him while he zig-zagged over the housing district, trying to find who was casting the jutsu.

_'THIS IS CRAZY!'_ he thought _'What the hell is going on? I'm running low on ideas, and I've got'_ checks sun, _'HOLY SHIT! I have about five minutes, though there is a possibility I am already late, no one is THAT good as reading the time. Okay, while in the vents, that last ball of fire was a "Katon: Goukakyuu no Jutsu", I'm sure of it. Who uses a majority of fire Jutsu? Actually scratch that, we're in the fire country. Hey Hitomi-chan! Are you up?'_

_'Snoooore'_

(Sweat drop) _'Well I take that as a no. Ok, something about those techniques are familiar, but what? "Goukakyuu" is a special jutsu, but how? Think... think... think...' _Snap. _'I remember a clan learned that move as a "right of passage". If I remember correctly its the"_

"Uchiha..." he whispered to no one, though apparently someone heard.

The second the word left his mouth the flaming death behind him ceased to exist, and as a congregation of ravens swarmed together in front of him, each new one hitting the mass turning into a section of the Uchiha genius, clad in standard ANBU armor.

"Itachi" he finished with malice.

"Hello, Naruto-kun."

"Bastard! Why are you trying to kill me now?!?! You had it perfect yesterday, yet you didn't, so why now?" Naruto retorted with thinly veiled rage, though he ended in almost a whimper. He had lost someone he trusted, someone he thought he could look up to.

"Calm down Naruto. You should at least understand that if I wished so, you would be dead already. No, I do not wish to kill you, you understand that to be shinobi, it takes hard work and determination to become powerful. I had not mentioned before, but I have walked into your training sessions before, and I believe that you will become a great ninja one day." the older boy said, as monotone as ever,

"You train hard, possibly harder then I had at your age, and it is obviously paying off. I did this to test your skills, because I believe there are too few who truly work hard in this village for it to retain its title as the greatest military power of the ninja world. I wish to train you." Itachi continued, and though lacking in KI from the day before, the emotionless voice seemed a tad bit happier.

It made you listen because of Uchiha only ever talked with superiority or arrogance. Happiness was only ever marred with either one or both.

"Ha ha..." Naruto chuckled embarrassedly, scratching his cheek to complement it, "well sorry for being quick to judge, but you want to train me? Thanks for the thought, and not to be rude, but you are an Uchiha. None that I have ever met before haven't hated me at first sight, heck, even Sasuke, while he was still some what less stuck up brushed me off once we met, and he's still a kid! What I'm trying to ask is, what makes you different from everyone else?"

"Naruto, I understand that my family is arrogant. People call me the Uchiha genius, the Uchiha prodigy, the ideal Uchiha, yet none even question why it is I am what I am. They believe, as my clan tries to promote regularly, that being an Uchiha gives you a birth right, a superiority, and they believe it so well that they have the gall to put my skill under the fact I had obtained my sharingan at such a young age, instead of the training I regularly put my self into. Technically it is because of the many near death experiences that occurred during the training that I obtained my eyes. Yet throughout all the blood and sweat I put out for the village, for the Hokage, never did anyone ever see me as a Konoha ninja, but as an Uchiha." Itachi said heatedly, or at least as much as he could. In a sense anyone who hadn't had to survive their entire lives by reading the emotions of people around them, it would be nigh impossible to decipher.

"Even my enemies had all done this. And this is where my answer comes to play. I am different... No, better then all the other Uchiha alive because I understand that a name is just a title to distinguish a person, and that the sharingan is nothing more then a birth defect altered by the chakra we are exposed to, turning into a familial trait. Because I see that for what it is, I trained to make myself and those I find worthy better, so one day the Uchiha name will once again be just a name, and Konoha ninja will be prized as the best shinobi of all the villages because they work the hardest, and if there are those that do not, then they hold no favour in the eyes of the people they should be protecting. As now I believe I am strong enough to find others to train to follow in my steps. I looked first in my clan. None appealed though. Then I looked to my peers, but at the position I am at, no one doesn't already understand this. Finally, I looked to those lower, and I had found you in that training area. It has actually been four weeks since I had first seen you, and I have come to deem you as a worthy person to carry on my nindo, my way of the ninja."

Naruto was just standing there slack-jawed. He had been chosen by someone, who as far as he knew was famous throughout the village for his skill, to be his apprentice! His life seemed so much like a roller coaster (whatever that was). He had become a ninja, his first big step on his way to becoming Hokage and gaining respect from those around him, and protect those closest. He then finds he is to be trained by the villages fore most taijutsu master. That in itself is a dream come true. Even though he trained in his mind with Hitomi, he was never able to carry on so in the real world, and so he just had to go through the movements to increase their fluidity, hoping that once he got a team he would practice the techniques in a live form, increasing the strength and physical understanding to how things were done.

Finally, here was someone who he could FEEL power coming from, and said person believed that he was worthy to carry on his NINDO! For Kami's sake, a ninja's nindo was the one thing that they had to work for, no matter what. It was their life, no it was what they lived for, and to wish to pass it on meant Itachi trusted him to everything. It was kind of scary now that he thought about it.

"... Are you sure about this? Really, I work hard because my nindo dictates it. No matter how difficult, I will never give up. Every dream, promise, expectation, they will all be accomplished, even if it means my death. I follow this with passion so that I can show the world who I am, but do you really think I'm ready for what you want?" Naruto said, somewhat frantically, not really noticing the redundancy to his words.

"You just said every reason as to why I feel you will help me bring this village back to its feet. My nindo and yours are the same in every way, except for how they came to be. Yours came from how you wish to exceed everyone's low expectations of you, and how you work to show them the error in their ways. It is very noble what you do." Naruto thought he saw a glint of pride in the other boys' eyes, though it shifted quickly to an unfocused disappointment,

"I, on the other hand, chose the path we follow because of disgust as to what I see around me. I wish to purge this village's obnoxious views and see its fruitation. Some may say it is the same, but I do not. Then there is your dream. It meshes perfectly to my own. Once you become Hokage, I will probably be clan head, and you can count on my support to help you along. As Hokage, it will become your duty to make the village better, and my dream only becomes yours as well from there on."

"Hmmm... I guess your right. Then I accept to become your apprentice. I will help you accomplish your dreams as you help me, and I will not stop until I do." The blond said with a true smile on his face, something that almost never happened. Then, another impossible thing happened.

Itachi smiled. FLASH. And it was gone...

"Naruto, give me the camera." The pony-tailed boy grinded out, barely suppressing his rage.

"Not a chance! You trashed my room, so this is your pay. Anyways I have very few pictures that I keep, so this is just one more, and no one will ever find it." Naruto replied, waving it off.

"_*sigh_ you do know that you have made me show more emotion in the last fifteen minutes then I have in almost a month. Well, keep that safe, it'll obviously last longer then the real thing." Itachi said in an almost defeated tone.

"Well I try my best to bring out the best! Well I... DID YOU SAY FIFTEEN MINUTES!!! SHITI'MGONNABELATESEEYALATTERANDWESHOULDDOTHISAGAINBYE!" exclaimed our favorite blond as he dashed to the training grounds. Luckily he had led the earlier chase in the general direction, so it would only be a minute or so long trek.

Looking at his new protégé run, he couldn't help but chuckle. He had predetermined that everything surrounding the boy would be... exciting, but something about the boy just made him feel in better moral. It was like he was driven to follow the boys natural vigor, the refreshing air he surrounded himself in, yet it should be the other way around. He guessed that it was just that he was a born leader. He looked around. Many people had seen the two converse, but most likely none had heard. They all looked with questioning faces as to why he hadn't killed the boy like he was trying earlier. The news would probably get to his father before he got home, even if he shunshined. He would probably be looked at sternly, since it had been long since his father dared scold his most prized son. Just as he was dissipating in a mass of leaves, he wondered how on earth gossip traveled at near speed of light abilities. Maybe if he harnessed it...

--Team Naruto's training ground--

Rikako was pissed. No she was pissed twenty minutes ago. Now she was furious. Not only did her teacher come exactly on time, five minutes after her which showed a lacking of etiquette, but it had been thirty minutes since and their second teammate still hadn't come. She had grown up learning how you presented yourself first to people was what counted most. Not only had her teacher not come early to greet them, but she had a tardy teammate! In battle being too late could mean the deaths of many. Maybe there was an actual reason for this to happen, but she could care less until proven.

"Sensei, will you at least tell me your name? I know as a team we should discuss things like that together, but you haven't even talked to me yet since you c- (!!)" Rikako stated in an aristocratic manor, until that is, something black, blond and orange flew from the forest in front of her, and collided into the tree behind her.

"Itaiiiiii!" it whined, rolling on the floor while rubbing the growing mound on its head.

Shakily trying to stand, Naruto noticed the two women that would make up part of his team. The girl he had met yesterday, Kenpari Rikako, if he remembered correctly, and another lady. This other person, who he identified as his teacher, had long green hair, which went about half way down her back. She wore long pants and a tank top, which pulled tightly on her generous bust. Loosely draped over her shoulders was a jounin flack jacket, which was abnormally long, going half way down her thighs with a double zipper that only closed the area around her upper stomach pulling it together and accentuating her hour-glass figure. Her pants were a dark green in color, and her shirt was slightly lighter. She also wore a pouch similar to his in the front of her waist, and another rectangular one tied to her upper left arm, which he guest had senbon in it because of it's size. As he walked closer he noticed she also had forest green eyes. They oddly seemed to calm him.

"Hi there! That was quite an entrance you made there. You must be Uzumaki Naruto, right?" the green clad lady asked, quite perkily, if he was to comment on it.

"Yes, I'm Naruto. I guess I should say sorry for being so late" he replied sheepishly, scratching the back of his head,

"Not a problem. I have no issues with you being late on our first meeting," she replied sweetly, though Naruto started to shy away as he noted that the sky seemed to be gathering dark clouds over head,

"But from now on, you are to come on time, exactly at time. If I ever have to wait again for more then a minute, the consequences will be dire" she ended calmly, though eerily so. Not to mention the random lightning storm concentrated overhead and the sudden dark blue and black background, it was much creepier then any "Big Head Jutsu" or "Scary Face Jutsu" ever could be. Thus, he decided to take heed to her words.

"Yes ma'am!" He said with military precision, straightening his back and saluting.

"Ah, no need to be formal, it's just your teammate asks lots of questions and it was getting on my nerves" she replied waving her hand as if shooing something away. In the background you could see a fuming Rikako, taping her foot with her arms crossed, and her face scrunched up in annoyance.

Wanting to avoid the impending apocalypse, even if he thought the girl looked kind of cute like that, Naruto asked, "So let's get this party on the road, shouldn't we?"

"Ya, that's a great idea! Thanks for the help Naruto! (Double face faults) Well I guess we should introduce ourselves. I'll set the example. I'm Izanami Mikoto. I am a special jounin who was in charge of the civilian task force, and I had to keep order amongst the non-ninja populace by taking care of crimes, all the way to making sure there are usable escape routes in case of emergency, or even clearing mobs. I like taking care of the kids in the orphanage, my friends, and seeing all the civilians under my care happy. I dislike ninja who believe kunoichi are less than shinobi. My hobbies are... well your too young but I'll tell you when you're older. Promise. My dream is help all my friends' dreams come true. You next, Rika-chan!" Mikoto ended with an excited smile, though she noticed that Naruto seemed disturbed by the things she had said about her favorite things. She decided to pursue it later.

"I am Kenpari Rikako. I'd like to not that this is very redundant to repeat our names when we obviously know them… Well, I like my family, my servants, and most everyone that is polite to me. I dislike rude people and people who don't take being a ninja seriously. My hobby is reading on medical jutsu and other things related to the subject. My dream is to become a legendary medic nin that rivals Tsunade of the Sannin. '

"You next Naruto-kun"

"My name is Uzumaki Naruto. I like my five precious people, training, ramen, and spending time with Hitomi-chan. Oh, and making new friends! I dislike stuck up snobs, people who lie, and when Hitomi-chan is disappointed in me. My Hobbies are to train, take photos of everything that I hold precious, and watch the sunrise an set, as well as the new moon. My dream is to be Hokage, so that I can protect everything precious to me, and also make this village a better place for everyone." He said, ending with a cheesy smile and good guy pose, reflective teeth and all.

After removing the sunglasses she got from who-knows-where, Mikoto decided to start the days work.

"Ok. Seeing as you kids are good enough to graduate so young, we will skip the genin survival test, and just do a teamwork exercises. Only after you complete them will I explain more about what our future holds. This will be a two on one fight, where you two will have to .and three hits on me each. The main rule is that you will have handicaps, like Naruto-kun may only use genjutsu while Rika-chan only uses weapons. Through the battle, I will call out changes, and failure to comply means you will restart both your hit counts. Other wise you can use any tactic you want, though I advise you aim to kill, any less then your best will lead to failure."

Getting to nods, she signaled the start, and two blurs sped to the forest around them.

"Naru has ranged weapons and Rika has taijutsu!" Mikoto shouted into the clearing. A hail of shuriken and kunai, and the only open spot being occupied by a speeding dark blue blur were the only indications of them hearing her.

Using a single senbon, Mikoto hit a nerve on Rikako's thigh, nullifying it, and making her tumble over, at least until two shuriken, coming from either ends of the field flew in, spinning obviously faster than normal, hit the senbon on either side perfectly, an because of the rotation, pulled it out. With the numbness in Rikako's leg gone, only a falter in step indicated any change occurring.

Now, Mikoto was trying to defend against the steel onslaught, only to find that many of the killer projectiles were actually genjutsu. And she was amused. Because they had yet to get a hit, she couldn't reduce their score, and she hadn't explicitly stated that they couldn't do this, it was fully legalized. She had actually expected them not to find this loop-hole until they messed up once or twice, but she guessed she under estimated them too much.

Rikako went in for a hit when she noticed her sensei was distracted. Taijutsu was her weakest point, but she wasn't bad at it, yet she doubted without some insane tag-team action she actually get the three necessary hits in on someone of jounin level.

Luckily, her teammate seamed to share her opinion, and within seconds of getting their handicaps, had given her an opining. She decided that she would trust Naruto in combat if this was a constant with him, though she still disliked him otherwise.

Rikako finally got within reach, and noticed random shuriken where passing through the both of them, but nothing was hitting. It was odd, but she didn't take a second thought to it. Though Mikoto-sensei did. Probably worried that Naruto had put his teammate's health aside for a personal goal, she flinched before trying to intercept the genjutsu. And that was all the time she needed.

Her teacher had her legs spread eagle, in a stance which looked like she was about to jump, and had many defensive holes in it, which Rika chose to use to her advantage. Sending waves of punches at her off-balance teacher, she was overwhelming the much more experienced tokubetsu-jounin(?) with the sheer amount of strikes she was dishing out, and she noticed a single kunai hit the back of her teacher.

Though it didn't pass through the steel woven jacket, it was still a hit for Naruto, and the hundreds of flying weapons vanished in an instant, leaving only a dozen or two impaled in the ground. The sudden hit seamed to shock their sensei, and Rika tried to punch her sensei three times in the stomach while disorientated, though only one got through her defense.

It was still a hit though.

As quick as she could, Rikako jumped back into the forest, trying to regroup with her "team".

"Nicely done kiddos. Naruto's got taijutsu, and Rika's gets ninjutsu!" was heard echoing throughout the training grounds.

Rikako just found Naruto speeding towards her and they stopped to plan.

"Ok, Ninjutsu is my specialty" Rikako said with a devilish grin.

"Well I'm probably best with taijutsu." Naruto replied, a pondering look adorning his face.

"So what's the plan?"

"What? Who said I was team leader?"

"Well I'm not a strategist, and you made a plan five seconds ago which landed us both a hit, so I say you know what you're doing better then me."

"Bu-"

"YOU MAKE THE PLAN!" Rikako nearly screamed, at least, as loud as she dared.

"_*sigh_ Fiiiiiine. Just to let you know, my plans involve some really intense time setups and lots of thinking on your feet, it's just how I work. So I need to know the types of jutsu you use and from there, we can go _wild_…". And so they brainstormed ideas, and if you could hear Hitomi, she would be laughing diabolically, or as much as she could as a cute eight year old girl, about all the strategies she had taught Naruto which were being put in use...

--Clearing--

Mikoto was on edge. Her team was good, and though Rika didn't like Naruto, she didn't hate him, and as for Naruto, even though the Hokage warned her not to think of him as the idiot who most thought he was, couldn't help but think other then not acting overly brash, Naruto was really the same as she remembered, kind, happy, determined, and overly unorthodox.

She had many dealings with the boy, even if he didn't know of them himself. She had a short, yet hard fought life, with much loss in it. The pain she had was one of the reasons she decided to take the position she had so she could keep others safe. And the job she got happened to get a LOT of complaints of a demon child.

She actually received so many complaints about him that she was forced to open a separate inbox specifically for him, and send a quarter of her staff to sort through it, or at least about a week in after, as she found absolutely all the complaints were either false, or were insanely over exaggerated.

Like seriously, a fox picked up a game token some kid dropped and everyone in sight freaked that it was a premonition of death from the Kyuubi, and that they should kill the jinchuuriki to stop it.

The saddest thing was, as she looked back on the incident, was that not only was that a lessened version of the true events, but that was probably the sanest she had experienced over the last four years of service. All in all, she was glad that part of her service died with her end of term.

One thing she did keep from those days, however, was the curiosity about the alleged demon incarnate. Though she knew everything most people did of him, seeing as she was twelve at the time of the incident, there were... anomalies... surrounding the boy.

First and foremost was, why on Kami's blue world did the boy have his own apartment five years before legally acceptable? Even ninja needed a supervisor before the age of nine, seeing as they held a position as "adults" in the village, age regardless, but when the boy was four he had lived by himself, and for all the years prior, there was absolutely no evidence to any housing. It was as if he lived off the streets! She knew he was an orphan, but she had never heard of him staying in any of the orphanages throughout the village, let alone any caretakers watching over him.

Then there was then there was the fact that within the first six months of his ninja academy life, he had shown absolutely no progress, then within another eight he could become good enough to graduate early? Finally ther-

She was brought out of her musing as she felt the presence of the genin. And she was quite impressed.

The two hid their chakra signatures insanely well, much better then many new chunin could. She almost went back into day-dream world as she thought of how these two, who were both a little less then nine years old, had such skill. No one she could think of, except for Itachi-san, could do this by the time they graduated.

She was pretty happy she stayed relatively aware of the situation, as suddenly she heard the exclamation,

"Doton: Inner head decapitation technique!"

Acting quickly, she jumped towards the tree line, which she couldn't sense a presence from.

Or at least until it was too late.

Somehow hiding in a luscious green forest with neon orange pants, Narutos seemed to be jumping in from everywhere. Getting into a defensive stance, she noticed a waver in the image in front of her, and deduced that they were Bunshin under henge, seeing as there was no way a genin could mask his presence THAT well.

Setting her mind on overdrive to find the signatures of her students, she noticed just in time of the coming attack and dodged with grace.

As the real Naruto went careening past her, the punch he was hoping to land carrying him forward with its momentum, he turned to look her in the eye. A grin cut across his face, which could send shivers down hard-boiled men's spines. It was the look of the prince of pranks' plan unfolding before his very eyes.

With a mass of smoke, all the Bunshin dispelled, revealing a large quantity of Rikako's hurdling towards... Naruto?

The clones all started passing through everything in sight, which made the entire area in front of the special jounin a hazy dark blue mass.

________________________________________________

Rikako thought the plan was something close to genius. They where so far, so good, and would likely succeed soon enough. She had early explained to Naruto of her abnormally large (for a kunoichi) chakra pool, and how she retained an excellent control over it. She had also explained that her family had gone to all lengths to prepare her for her future career, hiring tons of ninja masters to teach her over the years.

Through this extensive tutoring service she learned of her very high chakra affinity for earth, which she abused almost too a fault while she trained. She had learned how earth was hard and brutal, an excellent offence, yet an incredible defense.

With this her teachers taught her to be straight forward and never to back down, as was the way of her element, as well as her aristocrat family's motto. She had learned dozens of jutsu, varying from moving the earth from under an opponents foot to unstable them, too causing full-scale rockslides and creating forests of stone-spikes.

And Naruto gave her free reign to use them to her hearts content.

Asides from doing the Bunshin-mass mirage jutsu, something Naruto had invented on the spot, and using an earth platform to launch said blond at the now awe stricken sensei of theirs, she was to unleash her arsenal upon her unsuspecting teacher.

She was pumped.

It was not a normal thing with her, but being an energetic child in the very stiff, politic filled world of the absurdly rich she never was able to unleash the mass of energy pent up inside of her. In all reality, she was quite a tomboy, and was as energetic as a child could get (meaning half as bad as Naruto), but through thoroughly scrutinizing lessons, she learned her place. It was why, for over two years, she had yet to truly release her earthen wrath upon the world, and the reason why being presented with the opportunity was a pretty hard push for her in the direction of her normal, tomboy, ruffian self.

Some where in the depths of her mind, she knew that exploding like this could possibly reinsert her old self to the world, the one she hid over the years under the snob she was bred to be. Frankly, she really didn't care anymore. She just wanted to be free for the first time in years.

Finally it was time to enact the next step of the plan. Using solely her substantial connection to the earth, she stomped the ground in her little hiding spot, sending a cylindrical patch of earth, directly underneath the ramen addict's feet, upwards in inhumane speeds into the direction of the green beauty. Enough to send the piece of earth flying with the orange wearing boy

Maybe she was too pumped. Though it did work in the end. And she was dumb-founded at the result.

The boy she had originally classified as an idiot, plain and simple, had proven her wrong by graduating as early as her. Though she didn't really believe the idiot from the other day could be good enough, somewhere in the back of her mind she knew that the graduation exams only got lighter the older you get, and being a standard first year, the exams where tough as nails.

Then there was the revelation not ten minutes ago that the boy, though still an idiot, as she would always label him in her mind, was ACTUALLY reliable in battle. Though she would never admit it, the blond that her family had trained her to associate as a lesser breed had proven to be darn good at what he did.

But now, with the years of high breed brainwashing being swept away in mere minutes, she was again to be shell shocked by the pariah of the village as he fought... no, danced around their green loving sensei. He used his insane speed boost to get a head start, but instead of an all or nothing assault that she guessed most people would use, he dodged to the side as soon as he touched down and let the speeding platform that followed do the work. Then from there he proceeded to attack from every possible angle known to man, and easily a few only known to crabs.

Then, probably something she never expected possible happened. With a ninjutsu that, from what she could tell, temporarily stopped the functioning of the nerves connected to the eyes applied to him, Naruto was literally blind for the next twenty minutes, and it would take a skill with medical chakra only Tsunade had to reverse it with in-battle activities going on, so it was a no go for her to try to go out and help him without getting the shit kicked out of her.

With this knowledge she almost moved to the next phase of the plan without the mastermind.

Almost.

Feeling an alien, yet refreshing, wave wash over her, she stopped dead in her tracks and tried to sense what was happening, and she was amazed at the results. Steady bursts of chakra were coming from the blinded boy in front of her and continued on for a kilometre radius.

A quick fact was that a single burst with a meter in diameter, normally used to dispel genjutsu was a feat for a jounin, easily enough to disrupt heavily anchored genjutsu, and though in singular use it was a fairly small amount of chakra, continued use like what was being presented in front of her would drain the average jounin in a minute, tops. Easy to say why she was amazed.

Then there was the fact that the chakra felt odd. Normally chakra was something warm, cozy, something she liked to think of as being wrapped up in pre-warmed silk blankets. On the other hand, this chakra felt... cool. It was in all sense of the word, refreshing. It was cool, but in no way cold, like on a scorching hot day, the relief and energy that came with a cool gust of wind. That was odd in itself, seeing only people with bloodlines ever had different chakra, like the Hatake clan.

Speaking of which, like the clans white chakra, she noticed that the waves of chakra weren't a visible, translucent blue like whenever she saw chakra being released en mass, but made everything around her look like was veiled of pure, calm water, and from what she could see, Naruto was moving like a high speed slide show, jumping from one spot to another, and all the chakra he sent out disorientated whatever sense of where his exact location was.

There were so many questions she wanted to ask, like how on earth did this pulse seem to guide his movements, as from the picture she got that ridded every new pulse, it seemed that he knew exactly where everything was, and there was no way in hell that was instinct. Then there was, 'why did he have such a large amount of this strange chakra?', 'how did he learn this technique?', 'Why the hell is he so fast?', and so on.

But one thing she noted above all else. Through the years, she was trained to understand music, until she had its theory as subconsciously regarded as breathing. This caused her to immediately recognize a perfect quarter note of a four over four bars that was being followed by every pulse of the blond boy wonder's chakra. Somewhere deep in her mind she corrected herself.

Not a pulse, every beat.

________________________________________________

Naruto was at a loss of everything happening around him. First he was blinded. That was a fact. He didn't really understand much of what happened, but he knew he was pocked between the eyes just before it happened, and felt a surge of electricity. From there, he had tried to search his senses. He may not be as good as more experienced ninja, but his senses were fairly sharper then average and he believed now was a good a time as ever to learn to use them to a deeper extent. Maybe some extra chakra flowing to his ears would help a bit.

He searched deep into his body and tried to find his chakra, like he had hundreds of times before. He remembered when searching for it was such a chore that it was like trying to listen to his heartbeat while he stood in the center of the market place. Now, however, it seemed as simple as thinking a picture of Hitomi. It was just natural.

Although something was off.

Something shifted inside of him, like a high end car going from two wheel drive to four, as well as adding extra slick lubricant to help the process. It was... refreshing, as that was the only way he could really describe it. Like drinking a nice, cool glass of milk after eating a fresh baked cookie. Not only that, he felt as if he could savor it over long periods of time, if that made sense.

But something else told him that was only the tip of the iceberg.

He tried what can only be described as prodding it, and it felt like what he was looking for, but at the same time wasn't. It didn't seem to flow through him, like his life energy which he wanted. It was just, there.

He then tried actually finding his desired energy, and also found it was there where it should be. So what the fuck was this?

This new feeling gave him a sense of deja vu. It was eerily similar, yet completely different then chakra. Then there was the fact that it felt like _that_ chakra, her chakra.

He remembered when they first tried to have him wield it, and it had explosive repercussions, literally. It felt so natural, like Hitomi's presence, yet something else, like two animals fighting for dominance where waging war inside him.

It gave him power, oh so much power. It felt alien, yet so familiar at the same time, and resulted with a drastic change in his behavior, which even went as far as creating a temporary persona that controlled him, as he was in his subconscious along with Hitomi while he fought for dominance.

For a week Hitomi had guilt and self-directed disappointment written all over her, which he naturally believed was because she had miss calculated and almost hurt him. Even now, it was a touchy subject and they never tried anything of the sorts again.

But this feeling, this chakra, which he now believed it was, was different in many important aspects. A key similarity would be the overwhelming power. It was power that led you to believe that you could take on the world. But then, it wasn't overwhelming.

This power seemed like it was him, like it was no different from him, a similar familiarity to what he had before, but instead of an outside object that he was used to, it seemed like it was him already, that he always had it, somewhere inside him, like his own chakra.

Instead of fighting within himself, he felt a mesh. As if his chakra and this newer one worked together. Instead of becoming more animalistic in nature, like the previous feeling, he felt more concentrated, like his mind that was once muggy and worn, like the sewer it was once represented by, really did change to the vast open spaces he made it into.

Finally, with this power his senses changed. No, that was a bad description. He had a new sense, to accompany the first five. It was that he could _see_ the world around him. He saw things he shouldn't, like this strange glow around all living things, which varied in color between each species, and tone between each individual. He also saw the "blank" non-living things. But what he didn't see was an actual shape or image of anything. He was sure if he could actually see, however, the two sights would overlay.

He could also 'see' for a kilometer in each direction, no mater what should be obstruction his view, and from all angles. He could almost feel his mind whirring as it tried to process this new, better sight. He was pretty sure that if he could use his normal sense as well, he would have passed out from an overload.

This brought another fact. He didn't see the shapes of things. What he saw was this, glow, and from what he could tell, it extended a little out of each living thing, but not the others. The color also affected by the intensity of the glow, and he noticed right away the difference between the jounin-level ninja in front of him and a civilian just on the border of where his 'sight' abruptly ended. His sensei's was a much richer blue then the civvie''s.

A final thing he noticed, before deciding that he would meditate over the new discovery later, was how his eyesight seemed to flare in a pattern of exactly timed intervals, though in his mind it seemed a little oddly paced, and it slowly dimmed until he could barely see again just before the next "beat", as he called it, came again.

This seemed to affect everyone around them, as he saw a squirrel try to climb a tree, only to have the next beat come and it was momentarily stupefied as it ran into the tree it was going for.

He then noticed every single squirrel in eye sight seemed to be falling out of trees.

Because of this odd effect he decided to use this advantage on his sensei, so he could get this over with and save more innocent squirrels before they over crowd the Inuzaku vet-hospital.

___________________________________________________

Mikoto was having problems. Just a few minutes ago she had total control of the situation and was waiting for some team play to come in so she could get "overwhelmed" and let a hit or two slip. She then decided that it was taking too long, and wanted to spice things up a bit. Big mistake.

After performing a Raiton jutsu used to blind hostages and such on the boy, something weird happened. As a well experienced ninja, weird was equivalent to a girl asking Orochimaru out on a date.

The boy started... pulsating... if that was a good word to use to describe him. He had a strange distant look in his eyes, but not one of a blind person. He was focusing on something, no that was wrong. He was focusing on everything.

Then, barely a second later, her vision was distorting, as if someone ran a wall of water in front of her eyes, and she felt an oddly... refreshing, feeling come off the boy. That lasted for all of a second.

He then suddenly moved to a spot five feet in front of him, then, in what she subconsciously noted as a quarter beat later, he appeared almost exactly another five feet closer.

This continued until he was starting to attack her, and if it wasn't for her well tuned senses, she would have been beaten to a pulp. The odd sight _thing_ seemed to have no affect on the blinded blond, and even when she desperately tried to dispel a genjutsu, nothing changed.

After exactly fifteen bars of four over four timing later, he had landed his third and final hit, and was continuing onwards. She didn't understand why, until her danger sense started screeching bloody murder at her. After a quick dodge, the next beat in this deluded musical escapade brought to her sight a dozen blunted spikes protruding from the ground she stood before, making a hut like design. The next image showed her the spikes angled in her direction flying towards her.

Lucky they were off course, because her reaction wasn't good enough to dodge the speeding earthen projectiles a full quarter beat after they launched, not fifteen feet from her.

This exact event rolled out, with the inclusion of a few Naruto-taijutsu beat downs, until Rikako needed one more hit. She was currently hiding in a tree, praying to whatever Kami's where out there to fix her sight, because after the passing time, having a delayed and distorted vision, but perfect senses otherwise was starting to make her feel queasy. Wait, she was queasy.

As soon as she washed her face off, she felt a barrage of pebbles pelting her vest.

_'Damn'_ was all she could think.

________________________________________________

"Okay, I've got to congratulate you kiddies on getting through that test so well!" Mikoto said while they waited on their steak. Naruto had eagerly voted for Ichiraku(?) ramens for their first meeting, but the returning rich snob that was Rikako said that ramen was a commoners food, and she would only eat from the best. That's also why Mikoto's last mission's pay check was now going to vanish mysteriously in about an hour.

Not to mention the comment from Rikako all but predetermined that she would be eating ramen in the near future, due to a certain 'unofficial' blond sales associate.

Back to the present, though, the two graduates were beaming at each other. Or at least one was, the other had a rather Sasuke esque "We just kicked ass and proved Uchiha pwn" knowing grin (guess who?).

"Well hear, hear. Since you guys past with flying colors, I'm gonna tell you what our team is going to be about, since you should know how Konoha's team system works.

"First off," their sensei said, raising a finger to accentuate, "after a week or so of training, I think I'll be able to trust our team efficiency to start missions. But I have specific orders that we wont be doing any missions above D rank!" a cheery smile on her face. Too cheery, if you asked our blond, but he was too excited, they would be getting missions so soon!

"Secondly," another finger joining the first, "because we don't have a third member, and there are no reserve genin at the moment, we will be spending a lot of time in the academy, so you kiddos can get acquainted with possible future team mates. This also would mean that you guys will need to be out going will we're there, 'cause I'm sure they'll be intimidated by peers who already graduated. Got it?" raising an eyebrow in question. Two nods were her answer.

"Third (sorry kids, no more fingers, she must have forgotten), I expect us all to become friends. An unwritten rule that helped Konoha become the golden city it is, is teamwork, teamwork and more teamwork. Our village is the only one so far that has mastered making our ninja's team players, and even if some villages, like Kirigakure, may have singular ninja that are on a whole, better at some things then ours, we know how to make teams that will out do any single person in their fields.

"Take, for example, the Shika-Ino-Cho group. They are excellent at interrogation, stealth work, information gathering and full on assault. The three families have been working together since they joined at the beginning of the village. Alone, however, even if they are accomplished ninja, there are still better." she ended, her tone becoming more serious.

"One thing you have to remember is that there is someone better then you. Maybe you'll be a great swordsman, and never lose to anyone in battle, but then die at night because someone, who wasn't stronger then you, was better at hiding then you were at sensing them.

"Even our Hokages have met their matches. The Shodaime died not long after he defeated his best friend, Madara Uchiha, in battle, from a wound he received from the same person. And the Nidaime, though accounts vary, was said to have died fending off a battalion of four hundred ninja that were invading from an island fortress off our coast, single handedly, during the second great ninja war. And though he died, it was said that the enemy was so frightened by his sheer power, that they fled as our reinforcements arrived.

"Finally," She said, and even though she had a saddened face before, it seemed to grow even darker, "our greatest Hokage yet, the Yondaime, who defeated entire legions of enemy ninja single handedly, met his fate too."

With a bitter laugh she continued, "Some people said he was the greatest ninja ever, that no man could defeat him. It's ironic how he met his end not from a man, but a demon. But even then, he proved he was still a match for it, when almost half our village was swept away before they could even think of a counteract. Some said that through his lead, our village would prosper greater then ever before. If that damned demon didn't come then maybe he'd still be here and life would be better."

"Why do you say that." two faces quickly shot two the questioner.

"Why mourn him? Why mourn any of them? I was told that a warrior's greatest hope was to die with honour. As you say, all of the deceased Hokage proved their worth, each better then the last. We should be happy that they died with that sense. I learned that both the Shodaime and the Nidaime had a family, and got to see their children grow happily, even have their own kids. My teachers all say that, that is probably the greatest blessing for a ninja.

"Then also, the Yondaime may never have had a family, but he was the greatest leader we had ever seen, and to know that he was the reason that his village continues on to this day, he must have been at one of his happiest. He even did it alone, save for his toad summon." Rikako finished.

Something had changed in her demeanor. Where she had been changing back to her former self, holding her presence as one better then others, not looking anyone in the eye, and so on, now she seemed curious, her face aglow with child-like energy. Almost the same as when she had been told to blow her teacher sky high with earthen jutsu.

Naruto noticed the change during the speech of teamwork. He mused at the thought that underneath all her masks, she really wanted the ninja's life. A life where you, in all senses, got down and dirty. He also saw a glint in her eyes as she heard of the great escapades of the previous Hokage, something akin to a child finding out that their bedtime story hero was real, or something of the sorts. Maybe the term, stars in her eyes, would be good?

He then looked at the girl with a questioning eye. He had first taken her as some arrogant prick, but he was finding out more and more, she was just a girl who really looked forward to having great adventures and heroic deeds in her ninja career. Just she was hidden under a mask that her family believed was suited for them. Lucky she was on a team with the future greatest Hokage, then, since he would outmatch any bedtime story that was told about his soon-to-be formers in the job.

A second bit of luck came to her, as he figured, as a friend (as he thought that, he couldn't help but mentally grin) he would have to take that mask off. It would only be right, because he knew how much she would fear the repercussions after she did. He sure as hell did. Being smart was dangerous for a kid like him.

"Well your right, Rika-chan!" greenie said with a reinforced enthusiasm, "But in the end, all that I mean to get at, is alone, you may be great, but together, when you _know_ your teams strengths and weaknesses, you can be unstoppable!" she said, banging the table they were at to emphasize the point. Too bad they were in such a high class restaurant.

Seeing the gathering stares, both students sighed and shook their heads in disappointment. Even Naruto knew how to control himself better when the time came. Maybe that's why he liked their teacher so much.

Or maybe because he now had two more candidates for the title of precious person. That reminded him, after this he would need to find Konoha's own green beast. What was that training ground again?

________________________________________________

He loved the sun. It was the source of all life. It was always there, giving and giving, but as he sat atop the fourth's monumental head, he saw how absolutely no one in this bustling city actually paid attention to it.

He had just finished his training with Gai-sensei, and he had made a lot of progress for a single outing. He had yet to come to trust his male green clad sensei enough to talk about the incident at his team exorcize, but he learned that what he saw was most likely a persons aura, or soul, through some quick thinking and playing on words.

Flexing his arm, he could already feel the muscle healing over and becoming denser. Gai had found that because of the insane healing factors he had, he would have to exert up to five times the average to get the same amount of muscle wear, but when it did it would come out with about double the result. He was totally fine with that. Hitomi had told him a while back he learned best through practical experience, and since then he would train with as much of it as he could _*cough prank-then-run/hide cough*_.

With the thought he could see a person's soul, he decided to think about what it would mean. Thinking over the new discovery, however, came with way too many more questions, which lead him to come meditate over it now up here, watching the sunset.

_'Ok, first off, I gotta find out why it felt so similar to chakra. It felt like energy, power, which was pretty similar to what I can remember about her's. But then, instead of feeling stronger emotions, I felt more level headed. Also, instead of supercharging my senses, I got a different plane of sight, I think._

_'But the way it was there, how it was just everywhere throughout my body, instead of following the paths chakra would, that definitely means its something closer to her chakra then normal. Not to mention I could feel mine separately._

_'Hito-chan once told me about this. I think it was that her chakra was different because it was attached to her soul. While ours flows like blood, created through life experiences and physical memory, and though varying in quantity, hers would be made from the aspects of a persons soul, and would be different according to whom it was made from._

_'Does that mean she's over emotional? I'd think she was just happy... Well I'll ask her later. Maybe because she was originally a huge fox, the emotional aspect is really just instinct. That would make sense, since a fox would have much better._

_'But what does that mean for me? If it is the same type of chakra as hers, then why would I have it? Isn't it only able to manifest in...'_

"Demons" he whispered, opening his glazed eyes wide as dinner plates. Was that what he was? He had chakra still, but was he becoming a demon? He had heard tales of such things happening, and had past them off as bedtime stories to scare little kids. But then again, the Kyuubi was just a myth as well.

_'Shukaku, the Ichibi, was said to be a human who sought power and turned into a demon. Maybe that's happening to me? A demon. Hmm... Is that really such a bad thing? Most would think so, but Hito-chan is probably the nicest person I've met, and she's not even a human. Maybe I'm going crazy. Would they let a demon be a Hokage? Actually, that's a stupid question, I'd make them want me to be Hokage._

_'But why do I have my chakra still? From what Hitomi said, there SHOULD be only one possible chakra, or else I may explode or something. Hmm, I guess there's no point in debating it, it's either going to happen or not. So next up, what is up with the sight thing?' _He opened his eyes again. This time, he felt for the new source of energy prodded it again. Almost instantly he felt it surge through him and he _saw_. Now it was different, though, because he could actually see, instead of pulsating colors on a black canvas, he saw the world around him in more vivid shades. Trees were greener, the sky was bluer, and the central square looked like a mass of blue in different shades and hues.

Almost instantly he noted that he saw both his normal vision, which was slightly enhanced, and his new vision at the same time, yet not together. He could focus on one or the other, or even both in different parts, which was actually giving him quite a head ache.

He then tested the powers limits a bit. Pulling on the energy a bit more, he noticed that his normal vision was becoming blurry, but his other was becoming more refined, as well as able to spot more things in the distance. But again, the improvement came with a down side. Before, he could use his sight as far as he could see, but as he increased his output, it became limited to about a kilometer in range. His somewhat playful nature decided to push the limits, and he pulled on what he found was a bottomless well of 'demonic' chakra, grasping as much as he could with his spectral hand.

Shazam would be a nice word to accentuate the feeling with. His sight was limitless. He saw people hundreds of miles away. He saw the dragonfly landing on a tree thirty feet behind him, some guy with spiky hair reading some random book he saw a lot of adult males reading (three guesses), somewhere near the jounin lounge (two no longer count), and he saw a nameless child running through the woods with his friends playing ninja, probably, from what he could tell with his mental map, somewhere in the far end of the lightning country (I think that's the furthest, but if not, you bet my point).

Easy to say, he past out due to straining the old noggin.

________________________________________________

The Sandaime was totally at a loss for what had happened in the previous hour. He had just finished the days duel with his arch nemesis, which was oddly oversized due to complaints of rabbid squirrels, and was ready to pull out his favorite student's work of art, when he felt a tingle pass through him. Though he had never felt it in this way before, he knew someone was watching him, which usually lead to a monumental embarrassment from his grandson. He was just about to prepare a sermon for the delusional child, when all of a sudden, a cool, refreshing, wave past over him.

From that he knew that this wasn't his grandson. Not even finishing the thought, a dozen ANBU black op captains appeared in his office, stationed at every strategic location possible. Then, before he could even give a signal to his men, a wave of energy, so powerful, he couldn't help but think of the Kyuubi, went through his system, and he couldn't help but relax. It reminded him of the energy his 'adoptive' grandson would bring with him where ever he went, along with a mental image of the boys soul-piercing blue eyes, which he felt like they could see the world as it was, then what it could be with a little elbow grease.

But even that was all for a second. His old, but not any slower mind connected that a feeling of power, even if just a little reminiscent of the Kyuubi, and his blond ball of sunshine appearing in the same line of thought was probably the most hazardous thing possible for this village.

Without a single signal, the captain of the team designated to watch the boy, and, as he regretfully noted, trained for the purpose to silence him, if he was ever to break under the stress of his lifestyle, immediately left the office in search of the power surges origin. Not a moment latter, cries of panic erupted throughout his dominion.

_'That was just under an hour ago'_ he thought, looking at the clock in the hospital wall, _'and am I ever happy I still have what it takes to calm my people.'_

After he had adminished control over the peoples under his care, he had subtly ordered them to refrain from further activities for the day, and then was escorted to the hospital, which now held the unconscious form of one Uzumaki Naruto. Luckily, most of the higher ups in his ninja rank held no grudge against the boy, unless they fell under the wrath of some of his more devious pranks, and he was glad to boast his medical staffs, though limited, was professionally above having any thoughts of mistreating a patient, no matter who it was.

He had immediately learned that it was the blond jinchuuriki that was the source of the commotion, as it always seemed it was, and he had his top seal specialists look him over, and though none where on par to his student, Jiraiya, for even a fraction of the genius Minato-kun was, they all came to the conclusion that the seal, and in connection, the Kyuubi, had absolutely nothing to do with the shockwave. That was probably more troubling then hearing that it was would be.

So for the past, _checks clock_, fifty-six minutes and thirteen seconds, he had been pondering every single possible conclusion as to what happened. He had, obviously, come to over one thousand three hundred and forty four different dead ends. Oh, how he hated being _the professor_ sometimes.

The closest thing he had to an answer was probably that the seal had inadvertently, not only transfer the youkai of the kitsune into the boy, but had also changed him so that he could hold the devilish energy, causing him to be able to hold a similar energy and thus changing him into either a demon, who still had access to chakra, which he could still feel in the unconscious child, or, the boy just happened to still be a boy, but had his own youkai of sorts. Delusional, all of it, of course.

But demons were a tricky subject. There was no straight information on any of them. No similarity, except for some minor things, such as the bijuu being the strongest of the 'species', and that they were leveled by the quantity of tails they possessed. But even with them, none of their abilities, histories, anything where common, or even existed, for the matter. There were many legends, myths, and stories that were past around, but other then a widely accepted theory or another, there was nothing to go by.

It was as if, if not for the fact that the boy in the next room was living, breathing, undeniable evidence that they existed, he would pass them off as creatures of make-believe.

As another mad squirrel smashed into the window he was looking out of, a squeak emitting through as it slid down, joining the forty-three below, a sigh was all he could come up with.

_'I'm getting much too old for this shit.'_


	4. Them Changes

**Chapter 4**

She layed there, wondering what made her feel so at peace when _he_ was around. She had tried many times to think and act like she had before she was imprisoned, but each attempt died before the thought could finish. It was because he had made her change, and anything he did, she admired.

She didn't follow his every move blindly, it was just that he did everything right. Never had she seen or heard him do anything that could be classified as a bad thing. Not once. But for now, she thought it somewhat irrelevant, so she got back to her self-appointed task.

She tried to remember anything before her personal revolution, but she found, as time went by, so did the past. She knew that normally this would frighten, worry, or even anger her, that her past was slipping from her grasp, like the sands of time, but she wasn't. She couldn't. The only thing that she acknowledged was that the less knowledge she had, the less she could teach him with, and seeing as that was all she had to give, that should have worried her too. But it didn't.

Something had changed, all those months ago, when she had reawakened, and not just her miraculous discovery of humility, but her as a whole.

The first thing that had set off alarms was that she couldn't revert to the oh, so feared nine-tailed fox. Because of what she was, she could shape shift, which was a gift she had since her creation, which she was one hundred percent sure of. She could even remember that her ability lead to the myth that all kitsune could transform. She was even named a deity, though both facts were a bit hazy.

Back to the point, she seemed to retain her ability, though she could no longer use it to the same extent.

She had once been able to turn from the monstrosity that was her 'normal' body, into a pebble on the side of a trail, and no one would know the difference, but now, she was restrained to only things of similar mass, and they had to be real things. This downtrodded on her mood when she first found out, because she used to be the queen of pranks during a phase of her boredom, and her ability was the corner stone of most of them.

Not only that, but it now drained her to keep it up, and she always reverted to the girl's body she now used. Plus, it reawakened the mental scar that, she would never need it. Naruto was the only contact to the outside world, and though it was a happy thought to be so close to him, the obvious pain that followed the knowledge came back with vengeance.

The second shell shock was that it wasn't just a body, it was her's.

She had a body.

She had always had a physical form, and could even shape it to mimic a real one, down to the ability to feel same emotion. Being a soul with a body of pure chakra, she could only ever feel what affected the soul, almost only consisting of primal things. She had developed a curiosity at one point and tried to image herself as a creature, and for whatever reason, she had turned into an ordinary fox. Another story would be how she had found her 'perfect body' of the nine tails, but it would pointless as to her current subject. Not that she could remember it if it was, anyways.

The just of what she knew, she couldn't have a body as a demon, because it was not possible, but from what she felt, this was a real body.

Finally, though in reality was only the third major change of what would be a countless list, was that her chakra felt halved. It was not that feeling of depleting half her share of chakra, which she couldn't relate to seeing that it was impossible, but it was hollow. It was lesser then it once was. It had been thick, powerful, and by all means impenetrable, because of its immense density, if that was the right word. Now it felt less then that.

It was not a bad feeling, per say, which she would hopefully get to later in this recap, but it didn't make sense. Her chakra was basically her soul, which was so immensely strong that it generated a physical energy. If it lessened in power, that meant that she changed, and not in some life changing event, but she had changed as a being.

All in all, she had many theories, but there was one that fit perfectly, yet she didn't want to accept it. This was because it meant many things if it was true, and it raised many more questions then she had in the first place.

It was that she was turning into a hanyou, a half-demon, half-human.

It was a slow process, that was for sure, and she would have not even noticed, had it not been for three separate boosts in the process that seemed to send the change into hyper-speed. The first had been when she had awakened, when she had developed a body. There was some obvious change in her chakra, but she had originally passed it off as the seal taking it from her over the previous years of her slumber.

The second, was about two months latter, when the boy had changed his mind-scape, and had miraculously created a mental link to her, which was something she knew she would never be able to think up, create, then effectively put in place, some how bypassing a seal created by a God. This link, also seemed to change her chakra, this time in a huge leap. It finished about half of the effect that was in place now, and triple what it had been. This was, as she remembered, when her memory started flowing away from her.

Not only that, not even an hour after finishing his surprise for her, she had asked to try and use her chakra, seeing as this pathway may allow it. That had been a turning point, where she recognized the change fully.

She had told him that his soul had rejected hers, that it had caused a chaotic reaction, but in reality what happened was his soul started co-existing with her's. The only thing was, that happened for all of a second.

At that point, it tried to quell the foreign soul, which she recognized as a chaotic mess compared to the calm ocean she imaged his as.

Hers was like fire, untamable and powerful.

His was like the ocean, a calm, clear and overwhelming body, but also unpredictable, changing from the calm, refreshing open blue, to the wraith that was a storm, or tsunami. And like the ocean put up to the intense flame, it started to fulfill its task, but not with out boiling. (Note that this is all metaphorically speaking. Describing the indescribable usually always is)

That was the true cause of his rage, the chakra-poisoned laden burns, the entire training ground that he had used turning into an over sized koi pond.

It had hurt her more then any wound could, because when she felt that calm of his soul, she started to feel so much better that no words could explain it. Normally she would be scared of her flame being put out, but it didn't. She felt protected, and cared for, but she knew she could never again feel that, seeing how much it hurt him. Somewhere in her mind, she recognized the pain mainly came from the knowledge that they couldn't mix properly, though she debated many sleepless nights as to how those thoughts were to be applied.

The third, and easily most recent, had happened not five hours ago. He had done something, when trying to probe his inner senses after he had lost one, and that seemed to push some imaginary button that forced another change.

She felt the comfort of his soul again, but this time nothing changed like the boiling. Instead, something had physically (or not, depending on how you look at it) changed in his mind-scape. The runes that covered the vast mountain range glowed with a black light, and then imbetween the northern and eastern waterfalls, which where actually an embodiment of the vast amount of chakra the boy had, a geyser erupted, and it sprayed a mist which seemed to cover the entire area.

The mist carried that same feeling as the boy whose mind it was made in, that same refreshing feeling, and it had yet to stop. When it first started it was much stronger, making the air 'wet', but she hadn't minded. After a time, it had died down to a tiny spew of the same mist, though it seemed that the weight of the aura would forever remain, which it had still yet to.

She had actually wished that it would come back.

A little under five hours later, the geyser returned in a higher lever, but still not the same as it was before. She had almost tried to contact her jailor, but before she could pick up the phone that was the mental link, the flow had returned to its original strength, and just as she stepped out the door to bask in its glory, the geyser erupted.

The water started falling like the rain that she hadn't known in almost nine years, and with out thinking she just started running in it, over the rivers and up trees. She was the embodiment of child hood bliss.

She sadly went from that memory to the next, her fun dropping dead on the spot as she saw the body of the boy, who made her whatever she was now, start falling from the sky.

He fell from over three thousand feet, easily more and she watched in horror as he continued down. A split second before he collided with anything, she had jumped into him, wrapping herself tightly around him as she landed on her back not a moment later, due to the momentum he carried.

This where Hitomi was now, holding Naruto as closely as she could on the miraculously dry grass, the air, with that past, almost nonexistent mist drifting by, looking into the impossibly blue eyes, which were open, instead of being closed like normal due to the unconscious state he was in.

If it wasn't for the even breathing that came with the state of sleep, she would have thought he was just not moving and not talking, as his eyes where staring deep into hers, like they always would. Like he could read you like an open book. Look into your very soul.

Because he had his eyes open, she was able to notice the third change. His eyes were like icy mirrors, and she could tell something was different about the image they projected almost immediately. Her eyes no longer held a slit. When she had gotten her body, she noticed that the slit like pupils she once had seemed to be… fatter.

They seemed like they were slowly widening, and the points dulling, but she hadn't really cared. Now she was starting to think that they had just started their journey to what would be normal eyes, a journey now completed.

Then there was the fact that, his eyes had also changed. Though they retained the normal color, shape, pupils, there was a major difference. His eyes looked like they were made of shards of a blue diamond, and the were placed perfectly in what made the colored portion of his eyes, which name was slipping from her. They were arranged so that they pointed towards the center fixation of his pupils. A ghostly outline of each shard was all she had to even notice.

When she first saw this she almost squeaked. Pulling back a bit to look at the new discovery, she saw that the same shadowy outlines shift with the light. The positioning, sizes, everything seemed to move, like when you looked in a kaleidoscope and turned it from one beautiful picture to another.

These new eyes seemed to draw her in. They brought her a level of calm that she could never start to describe, but at the same time seemed to bring out the spark of her life full force. Somewhere in the logical side of her mind, she had started asking questions, like "How can his presence be so calming?", and then started recapping all the things she knew about this change, and every other that seemed to be happening up to the present.

This was largely ignored to the part of her mind which seemed reserved for situations such as this. It made her mind a blank canvas which had every detail of the image she was focusing on etched into it, never to be forgotten.

She was brought out of this daze as she registered that the crystal like shapes were slowly fading from the outside-in. From here she noted that she must have been inching closer, as her nose was a millimeter away from his, which was defined by the tingling feeling emanating from it.

She could hear her rampaging heart, which was beating through her breast into the one tightly squeezed against it. She could smell his scent so strongly, which caused her heart to beat even more wildly.

But most of all, she noticed as he blinked, which seemed to happen incredibly slow to her, how his eyes would go from unfocused to looking at her, how his void like pupils would contract, only to expand again as his eyelids returned to their positions, how blue dye in his eyes would darken and lighten, probably expressing some emotion she would be able to read, if it wasn't for the haze that enshrouded her mind.

She would later wish that the haze would last a little longer, as, as she regained her wit, she also became blatantly aware to how close they were to each other, how tightly she was holding him, how badly messed up her hair would be from the fall, and that he was on top of her, their bodies entertained.

Before the question that formed in his eyes was brought up, he landed with a thump as the space once filled with the bloody crimson-haired girl was emptied; said girl sat fifteen feet away, staring at the boy with some chimera of emotions written on her face. A healthy pink tinted her cheeks

________________________________________________

Naruto was at a loss for what just happened. He had just seen the entire world, from the blazing core, through to the highest peaks of any mountain. He had seen a continent that he never knew existed on the other side of the world, and had seen some bacteria in the ocean being eaten by plankton. Sadly, the image that once burned his mind was quickly dissipating; the entire map was slowly shriveling up, like a paper to a flame.

Black was all he saw for a while, how long, he may never know. Slowly, some image started emerging from the fog. A flame, perhaps?

He then thought he was looking into the sun, closer then physically possible for a living creature. It was huge, powerful, and chaotic in every sense of the word. He saw flames spew out hundreds, if not thousands of miles out, in the most unpredictable fashions. Yet he never burned.

It comforted him.

He had thousands of questions in his mind. He had no clue if this was a dream or not, but if it was, he didn't feel the numbing effect of restricted senses, movement or just any missing pieces of reality, but seriously he doubted his logical mind was working at the moment.

The sun didn't feel like the intense, dry heat of a flame. It was just energy. In it, it was boundless, undirected, and it didn't even have any form other then pure power. Of course he could say he felt the warmth radiating from it, but it was not like any flame he had ever felt. He had lots of first hand experience as to that, he sadly remarked.

Energy. He mulled over the thought. He was by no means a genius, but he knew trivial amount. He thought hard on all things related to the matter, from its undeniable, indestructible presence in everything, to why electricity was basically another form of fire.

While he continued his rant on energy and its function, another part of his mind registered that there were two anomalies (though he used a less civil term) in his data banks. Two unique chakras, to be exact.

He thought of the short list of things he had known of it, and decided that he knew next to nothing. He scarcely remembered an example of the person to person qualities, such as how the Ichibi's would, for some reason he still couldn't figure, be physically produced as sand, or how the Nibi's had some ability to enter dead bodies and have that part of her soul embody it, basically raising the dead to those undereducated. Even those examples were some what shady, since he had a very shabby memory, and he could only recall that one time that the topic entered in his brief teachings.

'One thing was certain, though, Hitomi had definitely said that normal chakra and the youkai didn't mix.' he thought, 'and I'm sure that I have a youkai now, it just feels too similar for it not to be. But I didn't explode? What's up with that? Umm… My eye sight got blurry, maybe that's this chakra's version of an explosion. That's a lame effect.

'Maybe it's because I'm not a demon?

'When I used Hito-chan's stuff, it gave me super senses and super strength. I think. At least before it started flowing through me like water through a broken dam. That hurt… I think.

'Also, when I used my thingy, I only got that weird super sight. Really, mine is so lame. I wonder if I turn into a demon, then maybe I could get more super senses. I-'

He was about to mess around with the weird power, but the second he let go of the somewhat weak grasp of it, he felt his vision waver, sending insane signals of pain to his mind. The image of the sun started to fade away, and at a distance, split into two orbs, turning into a bloody red.

It was a red he associated with one person.

The red orbs seemed to steadily grow closer, and after it past a certain point, his focus blurred. Hoping to reclaim the lost sight of the twin suns, he started blinking. It worked wonders.

He instantly noticed that he had his arms were wrapped around something. Something warm. He reveled in the feeling. He loved warmth. He could only think of one person when he felt it, because he was in some form of contact with her when he did.

Above all, those times were the pinnacles of his life. He remembered every detail of those moments, from what he could see, feel, hear, smell, taste, or every other imaginary perspective he could grasp while in his momentary bliss.

They weren't often, only when he accomplished something spectacular, or she was in a down mood, but he didn't care, he thought it helped him savor the few times he did experience it.

_It_, was a hug.

It was the simplest form of a non-verbal communication of affection. He had watched it all his life, whether it was two friends saying good-bye, a mother greeting their child, or even the times he was with the old man, when he met with his grandson. But for the first nine years of his life, he had never known what it felt like. On occasion he would get a pat on the back by the Hokage or ruffled hair from Teuchi-oyaji, but that was the limit of friendly physical contact he could remember.

There was a time, now years ago, that he would cry over his misfortune, but never again. Not since he made his nindo, about when he was four. He was sure that the following year was the toughest of his life, but it was all hazy to him.

But he had one hell of a confidence booster from the knowledge that he never gave up, and never gave in.

Now, however, he had just awoken from some weird dream to a warm hug. He wished he would have the opportunity to say "I could get used to this", but he knew that would never happen until he was older, he promised himself that much.

So, with serious regret laced in every action, he slowly moved back to decipher the image his eyes bestowed upon him.

He got a picture of a slowly retreating Hitomi, who looked… 'Frightened? No, that's not right, she's blushing again. Embarrassed? Bingo. But for wha-'

Thump.

Before he could even muster a reasonable question, he found Hitomi had mastered the elusive "Shunshin with no puffy cloud thing while unable to move no jutsu" which he wanted to make.

Damn, she was a good sensei.

________________________________________________

Hitomi blanched. Naruto had just explained the day's happenings, and her mind momentarily shut down. A faint, yet steadily growing sense of woe in her gut.

As her mind finished its resetting, one thought eerily floated to the fore-front.

'I was right. Plus interest.'

She had learned through a very physically expressive story of his morning escapades, which she had found herself deeply immersed in. Laughing at the funny, nail biting at the tension, even dramatic surprise to... well, to the surprising.

From there she looked at Naruto with a sense of pure happiness, all directed at him, as he told her enthusiastically of his encounter with his genin team. She couldn't help herself, seeing him happy was like a drug for her.

It slowly washed away; however, as he rambled onto the probable highlight of the day, still yet to be completed. The more he explained of his new found power, the more darker thoughts came popping up, and no matter how hard she tried, it was impossible to squash them all. Almost like trying to whack some annoying moles, or something.

Now, as he got to the part where he started combing over the info he had, she felt herself growing anxious. Her palms were getting clammy, beads of sweat, annoyingly slow as they cascaded down her back, and so on all adding to the anxiety.

All because he was growing steadily closer to the truth. A truth that she knew would hurt him. A truth, which even she didn't understand its reasons of its being. But the truth none the less.

In her mind, it was like some unfair trade. One that, even though dealing explicitly with them, they had absolutely no say in.

He traded his humanity, quite literally, for near unlimited power. The one thing that most men would, and as history oh so gleefully reminds us, sell their souls for. The one thing that Naruto would want least.

She traded an immortal (Not anymore, really) and soulless (figuratively speaking) life, God-like status, to be able to actually live her life (as much as you can in a guy's stomach). Something, in hindsight, easily would have done without a second thought.

'Would have', being the key terms of that sentence.

Now that she had it, she would give it up, a thousand fold, if it meant the knowledge that he would continue a life that he so obviously deserved. But the way she saw it, that was not likely going to happen. What he would get would be what she could dub as a half life, a cursed life.

He would live long, probably enough to see dozens civilizations form and fall. See those precious bonds he could forge, eroded by those damnable sands of time. He would be outcast. Ostracized. Probably even lynched a few times, and because of the half of what he kept from his original self, he would slowly break. It was the habit of all higher level thinking creatures.

And she would be there to see it all. To see the one person, creature, thing... boy... she would ever care for lose what nigh indestructible resolve he had. To be beaten.

He always aimed for the impossible. Now he had done it. He would, with her forever inside of him, be the one and only hanyou to exist. She had no clue as to why it was happening. She really didn't want it to. But it slowly was.

All the things she saw said it louder then any words could. The way she became grounded to a body. Her soul, a constant in the world, changing. In her mind, she saw life, the way only a human could, though rarely did. It was all part of this unknown trade.

But one constant seemed yet to break.

Energy, no mater what form, never disappeared, only shifted. A soul was a form of energy unknown to man.

As her soul becoming closer to the presence of a human, and as the balance tipped, his was ebbing closer to that of a demon. And it scared her in more ways then conceivable.

A soul was indestructible, untouchable, unchangeable, except for the consent of an Okami (Japanese for greater spirit or god). Its value, its strength, its durability, was the defining aspects of what the creature would be like. The only difference between that of an ameba to a human, or a human to a demon, was the way it was put on this earth.

Though the process and many other details were things humans are never meant to know, what was common knowledge (For her kind) was that it was possible to have a human to have a stronger soul than a demon, theoretically speaking. It wasn't much of a surprise however, that there had never been one single account of this in the history of time.

But something told her that her blond ball of sunshine would change that, too.

Just noticing that she had tuned out for a minute there, she refocused on the boy sitting in front of her, hoping that her unpleasant thoughts of his reaction, and future, would be false.

"-so that would mean, if it was youkai, that I am a demon like you, somehow keeping my human chakra, or a human, somehow getting access to my soul's energies. Maybe something like a hanyou..." Naruto said off handedly, tapping his chin in his 'I'm thinking hard' pose.

"So what do you think of it, Hitomi-chan? You obviously know more of it then I do." He said, relocating the blue spot lights back on her.

She could feel the deflating sense of anti-climaticism. He had just debated the thought of being a hanyou like the weather (Then again, with a life like his, and things like this _would_ seem normal), and she could almost hit him. She had just worried herself sick at the thought of breaking it to him. How emotionally scarred he would be, and how hopelessly lost she would be without his beaming presence. How she would sell her soul to get him his back.

'To set his life straight I would do anything... ANYTHING! And he can sit there asking me my opinion!?!? THE NERVE!!!'

She would hit him.

Too bad (For him) that she was once the strongest creature that had roamed the earth.

After a second wakening from a comatose state, a perfect mold for a full sized Naruto action figure implanted conveniently in the mountain side, Hitomi nervously invited him into her house to talk.

________________________________________________

A grunt was heard as the Sandaime lowered his creaky old bones into a seat besides his adoptive grandson. In reality, he did treat the boy like he would a son, teaching him, scolding him, and giving to him in his moments of triumph, or standing by as he recuperated from what would be instantaneous death causing incidents for any normal human.

It was a fact that would haunt him to his grave.

He loved the boy. He would do quite a lot for him, but one thing he knew was just a sad truth, was that somewhere in his old, dusty mind, he didn't see the boy as a _normal _human being. It was something he had hoped to beat as a child, the close-minded effect that age brought upon those who followed it.

He, in no way what so ever, held a grudge against the boy (At least over this subject, that blond could cause the city to fall into more chaos then the monster he held inside of him could). He did, however, notice, as his ever observing gaze fell upon the source of his past decade's worth of energy, the not so subtle difference between it and those he governed.

One of the most obvious things that any person close enough would notice, was that he could not hold dark emotions.

He did not hate.

He did not loath.

He did not envy.

He was not wrathful.

He was not boastful.

He was not gluttonous.

He was never a sloth.

He could not be evil, in any way, shape or form.

And that scared the old man. He had seen seventy years of the world, and though it was not even a noticeable blotch on the ongoing list of history, he had seen much, and knew even more. What lay beside him fell under no such category. Save one.

An anomaly.

The boy could feel those emotions, something he had seen when he was younger, a sign of humanity. Though it did not last. Not only did they disperse when the new dawn rose, but a little less then half of the life he had lived so far, he gave them up.

And had yet to fall under the humanly weak will.

The Sandaime was all for this. He lived for the thought that his entire village could be as the boy, but now he saw it, it was unnerving. Being the man he was, however, this unnerving feeling grew a more curious one, because it was the same one he felt when he observed his deceased successor when he was around the newly made man.

The Yondaime and the jinchuuriki were so similar it hurt. Literally. His deductive mind could reason that Naruto was Minato's son, whom was believed to be dead to the world with his beautiful, and secret to the few he trusted with his life, wife, whom had a "miscarriage". Sadly his deduction, no matter how blatantly obvious, was no solid proof, and would never be.

The boy would never know his parents.

He had seen it, and even heard from the boy's mouth, that he feared the knowledge of his parents. He was the same as every orphan he had met, and though somewhat relieving to know another earthly bond the blond had, was otherwise sad to know.

He feared that his parents had abandoned him.

There was a time, when Naruto was so close to breaking that the Sandaime had, on many occasions, pondered the thought of ending the boy.

To keep his people from a rage induced assault from a child, who he presumed, had the same ability to control a portion of the God like powers inside of him as those that preceded him did, was an underlying reason.

If not that unholy thought, then to save the boy from killing himself. He had seen the life die from the boy's eyes. He had observed, through his crystal looking glass, the way he would sit, literally hours on end, even days at a time, when he found himself lacking in funds to do anything else (Namely eating or finding a shelter, which would only house him for quite a fee).

As he sat, he did the one thing that people took for granted. He looked, and listened.

Though he had never questioned the boy upon it, when the ordeal was over, and the "will of fire" ignited in the boy, as he preached so thoroughly about, the boy had a sense to him of knowledge and wisdom that was unknown to almost all creatures of this earth. He never acted on it, and held the pretense that he didn't have it, but it was there none the less.

He had seen the boy walk, talk, and even think like a carefree child, but was anything but. He had used his monthly allowance the Hokage had bestowed on him so meticulously, that he seemed like a man well versed in the world of money. Buying the best place he could for the most reasonable price, cooking his own food, and buying the even cheaper bowls of ramen when he couldn't.

Naruto had grown up fast. So fast, that it seemed like the adult side of him separated from his normal, good-willed and carefree self, and only to come out on the exceedingly rare occasion.

Somewhere, that other Naruto waited, and in times of need would appear, and the Hokage was sure that even Naruto didn't acknowledge the other presence. It was truly a strange case, the boy would change between the cheery, hard-driven, unstoppable force of pent up energy into the young man that had seen a fair share of the world, who was logical, emotionless, and cold to all he met.

It happened like the change of the tides, there was always some precursor to the event itself, but it could happen in a heart beat. The old man would never forget when the boy had first changed, when he had given Naruto his allowance, and the blond decided that he would rent an apartment for himself, he was like a machine.

Naruto had quickly, and with utmost efficiency, found the apartment he lived in to this day in the run down area which was a place that was destroyed during the Kyuubi's mindless assault. The land owners were so run down that even when the boy they despised, who had already taken all the facts into consideration, came, they couldn't help but accept the terms of his contract, which was like paying them with dirt.

And it scared the aged Hokage.

Naruto was the kindest, most considerate person he knew, and he had even personally witnessed the boy try to relocate an ant colony because it was in the path of one of the more commonly used forest trails.

But he had used the desperation of the landlords, tied to the sublime fear that they had of him into manipulating them under his will.

That boy was a genius.

That boy had great talent in the field of interrogation.

That boy had much untapped potential.

That boy was not Naruto.

Naruto wouldn't do that even when his life depended on it, and it had on many occasions.

It amused Sarutobi to no end that the boy, so dead set on a job of the most dishonorable in all the world, would never do half the things that a ninja was supposed to do, which were even drilled into the minds of the candidates of the career through the 'ninja's code'. He knew it was one of the aspects that would make the boy who knew no love become the greatest ninja the world would ever see.

But the boy would face unbearable hardships, possibly hundreds of heart breaks, and even more mental attacks before it would happen.

Before he could continue his musing at the topic that was Naruto, said boy awoke. It was so quick, that he might not have even been asleep in the first place, and as he sat up the bed sheets rolled off him, exposing the hospital garb he had been adorned in when they took him in.

"Ah... It's good to see you awake, Naruto." said the Sandaime, in the rough, worn voice of his. Naruto blinked and slowly turned his head to the Hokage, and it was then that the elderly man noticed the look of... well a look that said the boy had experienced something shell shocking, but if it was a positive or negative thing, only time would tell.

"Hey Jiji..." Naruto replied, instantly regaining his facade of happiness, "Do you think we could talk in private?"

Sarutobi felt disturbed by the question, Naruto was never one to beat around the bush, but the abruptness of it was off. Replying with an affirmative, he noticed the missing presence of his ANBU guards that had been scattered around the room, and the seals that they had expertly placed that denied the entrance or exit of sound unless an insider were to remove them.

Giving Naruto a nod to confirm they were truly alone, the boys eyes instantly became neutral, the happiness that was so natural for them replaced by the blank mask. It amazed the Hokage to this very day that the boy could mask emotions so well.

"What do you think of demons?" was a question so off handedly asked it almost had the hard-boiled ninja shocked,

"Demons? Why do you ask?"

"Please just answer me, Ojisan, I need to know." A silence soon past over, and while neither face expressed any of their thoughts, one of was going into overdrive.

'Demons? Why would he ask that? He might have heard it from the villagers, which would explain him on top of the Hokage monument, but he had never asked me before... Does he know? If he does, how? I specifically ordered the Naruto corps to eliminate all who try and break my law. Maybe he's just is curious. No, that can't be, he wouldn't ask a question like that. Then what? I'll have to watch my words'

"Naruto, demons are creatures with immense power. Other then that I sadly admit I know nothing definite on the subject. Is that enough?" He stated, with a sense of hope in his last sentence, though he knew it wouldn't cut it.

"Ojisan, don't kid me. You and I both know you didn't answer my question."

'Damn'

"Naruto. I will tell you my opinions, but you must tell me why you are asking this all of a sudden. All right?"

"Oh, I planned to already, but whatever. Yeah I will."

And silence ruled again.

Breaking the slightly awkward fog overhanging them, the Sandaime slowly spoke, each word said with utmost care, as if walking a mine field.

"Naruto, in truth the only contact with a demon I have known is when the Legendary Kyuubi no Kitsune attacked. You know this, right? Well what happened, in my opinion, was just a bloody, unnecessary slaughter. When we heard that the Kyuubi had... reawakened, and was heading towards us, there was much panic. Even though I wasn't Hokage at the time, it hurt me to know the people were so terrified. Luckily I had chosen wisely for a successor.

"The Yondaime was immensely successful at quelling the fears of the people, and for about a month the people lived in a fragile calm. But the fearful knowledge that the beast was slowly approaching, which almost guaranteed the deaths of all in the village weighed heavily upon us. I won't bore you with my long speech, but the fear the Kyuubi brought to us was immense. And when it came, all those who tried to fight it off, and as the demon steadily grew more enraged, the more people died. In the end, you know what happened. The Yondaime sacrificed himself to defeat it, and we were given the chance to rebuild.

"In the end, because of the unworldly fear that it caused my people, and the pains and deaths that it invoked, I sorrowfully admit I despise the demon. But, I have no idea what others would be like, though similar stories lead me to believe all demons are as such, so that is what I hold as a standard until proven otherwise."

Naruto let out a sad smile. It was a smile laced with the pain and fear that he had known all his life. The pain and fear that came when you were to be discarded as easily as trash. With a sorry sigh, he worded response. Hopefully some divine providence would give him the ability to deal out his news, with the subtlety and discretion that it would need.

"Ojisan. I am a hanyou."

'God damn the gods.'

The Sandaime had been left speechless. A feat never before done since he was a chuunin still working with the Nidaime as his student. What the hell did you even respond to that?

Hopeful that some explanation may remove some minor...very subtle... almost inconceivably small amount of the awkwardness that hung in the air, Naruto pressed on.

"Jisan, I think that the Shiki Fuuin that sealed Hito... the Kyuubi, did something weird and transferred part of me into H- it, and it into me." Now gaining back some semblance of speech, the Hokage had a scared look on his face, 'or is it nervous?', as he questioned,

"Naruto, how do you know about the Kyuubi?"

Now it was Naruto's turn to wear those questionable expressions, before he remembered something that Hitomi had told him earlier.

--GO BACK IN TIME! GO BACK IN TIME! GO BACK IN TIME! GO BACK IN TIME! GO BACK IN TIME!--

Naruto and Hitomi just finished there conversation about the happenings of their lives, and were just moving onto what to do about it.

"I think we should at least tell Jisan, he may be able to help us out on this stuff"

"Naruto-kun, you should know that not everyone has a demon, even one that's on the verge of losing her memory, to explain to them about us. You probably know more about demons then the Hokage does... or any other human on the planet, for the matter." Naruto adopted a dreamy grin as he imagined some random game show where they got questioned about demons and himself as the winner of said show. His very odd daydream was cut short as Hitomi continued her speech,

"And Naruto, you have to remember, you and I are going to be the only hanyou you may ever hear of. Remember that because we are the only ones, there may be some major differences between us and anything else."

"Yeah, yeah, but we should tell the Hokage, seriously. I'm a ninja now, I gotta act like it too, ya'know?"

"But are you going to tell him everything? Do you think he'll be ready for that? I think that you should tell him, but try to censor parts that you can leave out. Just tell him the most important things." Leaving Naruto to some deep thinking, it would be a few minutes before he would ask himself,

'Can I lie?'

--BACK TO THE FUTURE! BACK TO THE FUTURE! BACK TO THE FUTURE! BACK TO THE FUTURE!--

He decided that he would answer the question now.

Normally he was the world's crappiest liar. He could never deny someone of the truth, and doing that to someone he held as close as the Sandaime, he would tell him the truth anyways. Actually, he couldn't remember a single time he had lied to his precious people.

He looked into the Hokage's eyes, which looked sad and regretful; his own were masked with child like innocence. But underneath, he could help but feel blank, empty.

The aspect of being able to outsmart someone, so off handedly as just an utterance of a few words, that would forever be held in belief until he chose to bestow otherwise, it taunted him. It called to him. It promised him power over other.

Somewhere in his mind, he knew he should be acting differently, from learning he was the container of the Kyuubi no Yoko, to becoming a hanyou or deciding to even think to deceive one of his most precious persons.

He should have been freaking out. Angry at the world, or at whatever God he could think of. He should be angry that his life was decided for him before he was born. He should be sad that those claims of him being a demon were now half true. That he would never be able to really live now that everyone and every thing around him would die centuries before he would, 'or at least that's the most probable thing, since I still have a mortal body'.

But most of all, he should feel guilt for what he was about to say, but he didn't. He couldn't.

So as he looked into the Hokage's well aged eyes, he did one thing that would bind him to that empty road known as power.

He lied.


End file.
